Operative Word
by rabidcrazygirl
Summary: DESTIEL FIREFLY AU. Dean Winchester and the crew of the Impala live on the shadier side of the law, scrounging and scavenging for paychecks that seem fewer and further between. But when a mysterious man who calls himself Castiel offers cash up-front for a one-way trip to an outer planet, Dean and his crew find themselves with a bit more Alliance trouble than they had bargained for.
1. Chapter 1

Dean Winchester _itched_.

Under his collar, beneath his cuffs, along his waist, down the seams of his pants... if he hadn't known better, he'd have punched the guy at the tailor shop for selling him a suit that was undoubtedly made out of live ants.

Instead, he was forced to settle for making a face as he tugged at the offending fabric, wrenching it away from his protesting skin.

"Stop that," Bela whispered out of the corner of her mouth. "You look like a twitching cockroach, darling, it doesn't suit you."

Dean leveled a glare at her. She, of course, looked perfectly radiant and at-home amidst the intimidating grandeur of their surroundings. Her floor-length gown was pale green silk, and boasted a neckline just on the tasty side of tasteful. She could (and had) charmed everybody in the joint, and Dean couldn't help but be jealous of the ease with which she ingratiated herself to others.

"Still don't know why I had to be your date," he grumbled, snagging a handful of too-tiny sandwiches off a passing tray.

"You're not my date, you're my accessory," she retorted. "Now. Captain. Shall we mingle?"

With a grumble, Dean took her outstretched arm and allowed himself to be paraded around the room.

_This should be Sammy's job,_ he thought, stuffing miniature food into his face with his free hand. _All this bowing and scraping and knowing which napkin to wipe your ass with at the end of the night._ Sammy was the one who knew how to rub elbows and shoulders and whateverthefuckelse with the rich and powerful. He had training.

But that was the problem, wasn't it? He had training, yeah, but the odds of someone in this crowd recognizing the Backwoods Whiz Kid from Helios Law were just too damn high, and Bela had needed someone to look pretty, complete her sophisticated image, and blend into the background. _Dean Winchester, up to bat._

Sammy hadn't put up a fuss when he'd been benched. Dean made a mental note to get him back for that when they were back on the Impala.

"Why do you people always have your fancy parties at museums like this?" Dean muttered to Bela as they ambled past a massive ice sculpture that had been carved (inexplicably) into the shape of a pirouetting squid. "The way these guys are pounding back the drinks... I get drunk, shiny things start to go missing. Seems to me, you're asking for a sticky-fingered mayor of wherever to walk off with half the art collection."

"Not everyone has your sense of decorum, Captain," Bela whispered back, nodding calmly at two immaculately dressed young ladies as they passed.

A light squeeze on his arm from her manicured hand - "There -" Bela muttered, her eyes flicking towards the side of the room for the briefest moment. He followed her gaze - sure enough, there was a small door set into the wall, insignificant to anyone who wasn't looking for it. Bela stopped walking, releasing her grip on Dean's arm. "If Crowley's information is accurate, the necklace should be through that door."

Dean nodded. The job. Action. This was something he could get behind. "Alright," he said, "What are we standing around for?"

Bela just smiled and patted his shoulder (Dean tried not to feel like an idiot German Shepherd being praised for licking his own balls). "I do so love your enthusiasm," she told him, "but you will absolutely not be accompanying me."

"What - but -" Dean sputtered.

"The phrase 'bull in a china shop' springs to mind," Bela observed neutrally. "Just stand here. Look pretty. Eat something." She grinned, her smile sharp and thin. "You're good at that."

She had disappeared before Dean had time to protest. Bereft of company, he glanced up at the dancing squid. "But I'm the captain," he moaned quietly to his icy new friend.

The squid did not deign to reply.

"Dumpling?"

The voice was low, gravelly, and utterly intrusive. Dean looked up into a pair of unsettling blue eyes.

When he was younger, Sammy had been obsessed with the history of Earth-That-Was. He'd read everything he could get his hands on, and when he ran out of stuff to read, he'd come find Dean (typically elbows-deep in some part of The Impala, making sure they'd make it to their next port) and vomit knowledge all over him. It had become a kind of soothing background nothing to Dean, just words washing back and forth in easy waves.

Despite his best efforts, some of that learning had stuck. Now, in this moment, Dean's mind called up the image of the Bermuda Triangle, all azure-blue and just as deadly as this man's gaze. _ But hell,_ he thought,_ if this is drowning, maybe that ain't half-bad._

It took him a moment - his brain ordering his eyes to _zoom out, zoom out,_ before the stubbled face of a suited waiter swam into view.

"Uh," he managed eloquently.

There was a long moment, and he experienced the uncomfortable sensation of the waiter's eyes scanning him from head to toe. Finally, the man nodded.

"Very good, sir," he said in that same broken-glass voice. He and his tray brushed past Dean, headed for a portly man and his beautiful Companion.

Dean blinked.

_What_ -

He couldn't be positive, but - he could've sworn that as the waiter squeezed past him, Dean had felt the hilts of at least two knives sheathed at the man's waist.

Anywhere else, this would have been shiny and happy, but here? Well, Dean had been forced to check all his weapons at the door. So what the hell was a damn waiter doing all spiky like a porcupine?

"Dumpling?"

A young woman this time, suited and carrying a tray of the steaming treats. Wordlessly, Dean took two, searching around him for any sign of the blue-eyed waiter.

There was no trace of him. He'd disappeared.

"Time to say goodbye, Captain."

Bela was at his elbow without any warning, and Dean had to physically restrain himself from jumping. She latched onto his arm with an ease that no one who had just committed grand larceny should be able to exude. "I believe we've reached the 'hasty exit' portion of our evening."

"That so?" Dean's eyebrows were making a break for his hairline.

As if in response, the alarms system began to scream. Bela fixed him with a cool look. "That's so, darling."

And with Bela practically tugging him towards the exit, Dean barely had the chance to glance over his shoulder, searching one last time for the mysterious blue-eyed waiter.

**xXx**

It took a monster-sized portion of luck, and the better part of Dean's childhood-honed street smarts to get the pair of them from the museum to the shipyard without being flagged down by any Alliance law enforcement or grabbed by a drug-happy mugger willing to try his luck with anyone whose clothes looked just a bit too new. When the sleek outline of the Impala rose into view, Dean breathed a sigh of relief.

"Home, sweet home," he heard Bela mutter next to him. He made a conscious decision to ignore the sarcasm dripping from her words.

"Damn straight," he responded.

By the time the two of them were aboard, the loading ramp raising behind them, Dean was starting to shake off the tension of the night. The disparaging snorts of the rich, the weird-ass ice sculpture... that waiter... it all slid from his shoulders, and he could feel his spine straighten.

Taking mental inventory of his surroundings brought in that familiar rush of pride. The cargo bay, spotless and spacious. The well-maintained cockpit. The comfortable (if not necessarily roomy) bunks. This was home. This was where Dean knew who he was.

"Everything go okay?"

Sam Winchester was too tall for this 'verse, a fact Dean would never let him live down. The man was six-foot-four, if he was an inch, and he felt every single centimeter of that height in the low-ceilinged hallways of the Impala. But he took the metal ladder down to the cargo hold like he had been born and bred there (which, Dean reflected, he had been), and landed in front of his brother with practiced ease.

"Shiny," Dean responded. "You should'a RSVP'd yes. I ate some tiny sandwiches, and Her Majesty's got the loot stashed... somewhere."

When he looked over his shoulder, Bela was holding the necklace. He hadn't seen it as they'd made their escape, and there was very little room in that dress to stash much of anything...

"Don't ask," Bela said in response to the question that glared so heavily in his expression.

"Everything quiet here?"

Sam shrugged. "Charlie reckons she's got us ticking along smooth with the parts she and Bobby salvaged this afternoon. Other than that, not much of anything to report."

"Sorry to burst your bubble, Samsquach," drawled a low voice, "but we might have just the teensiest bit of an issue."

Dean and Sam both looked up towards the cockpit, where Meg Masters, resident pilot and smart-ass, was leaning against the rail. She cocked a hip, fixing them all with a sardonic grin.

"Seems your little stunt raised a couple of red flags," she said. "Just got word - Alliance cruisers are hobbling all boats trying to make it out of Helios's airspace, searching for your trinket."

Dean grimaced. "That puts a bit of a twist on matters if we want to make it to Crowley with our asses intact."

His brother shrugged. "We could take a breather. Twelve hours or so."

"Let their little tizzy work itself out?" Dean smiled. "That short Alliance attention span. Such a shame."

"We bunking down for the night?" Meg wanted to know.

"Crowley won't be pleased by the delay," Bela muttered.

"Yeah, well it's either that or release his lovely necklace into the caring hands of Alliance custody," Dean snapped.

Bela shrugged, unfazed. "I'll let him know." She disappeared towards her bunk, even as Meg made her way back to the cockpit.

Sam was watching Dean with an all-too-knowing expression. "Everything go okay?"

The image of blue, unreadable eyes swam before Dean, unbidden. He blinked the memory back. "You're starting to sound like a broken record, Sammy."

"You're never this on-edge when you come back from a job that goes smooth."

"Yeah, well, maybe I just don't like hanging around all those Core _Go Neong Yung Duh_ -"

"Dean -"

"I need a drink."

He should have guessed that Sam would follow him into the kitchen. The kid was like a dog with a fucking bone - when he got hold of something, it took more than a few spritzes of water to force him to let go.

"If something's up, Dean, you've gotta let me know."

"I swear to God, Sammy -"

"Would you pipe down, you idjits?"

Bobby Singer was glaring up at the two brothers from the kitchen table, where he had what looked like an entire planet's worth of produce spread out. He was busy peeling his way through a mountain of potatoes, and bits of the shredded skin clung to his beard. This fact did not render his irritated look any less intimidating.

"Sorry, Bobby." It was a familiar chorus from Dean and Sam. Bobby nodded, mollified.

"Just don't want you waking Charlie. The girl's worked her ass off today, and it'd be a fine thing if you two morons paid her back by waking her up."

Sure enough, Charlie Bradbury was asleep in the armchair set in the corner of the kitchen. Still wearing her oil-stained coveralls, she had curled up around herself like a pillbug. Somebody - and Dean was inclined to think that somebody was a soft-hearted, bearded, gruff old man - had seen fit to find a blanket to cover her up in. Despite the headache brewing behind his eyes, Dean found himself smiling softly at the sight.

"Here." Bobby plunked a plate loaded with delicious-smelling dinner in front of Dean, and handed him a pair of chopsticks. "They never feed you enough at those grand-ball-things."

"It was all tiny," Dean agreed, digging in. "I didn't know you could make dumplings that small."

"Core folk," Bobby snorted, shaking his head.

"We're laying low 'til morning," Sam supplied as Dean continued stuffing his pie-hole. "Alliance got wind of some thievery, so we want to let them blow off steam before we make a break for it."

Bobby nodded contemplatively. "Smart," he said. "S'what your daddy would'a done."

"I figure we leave around oh-seven-hundred, Standard," Dean said, spraying crumbs across the table. "The shipping rush'll be on them then. They won't be able to stop everyone who needs to get off-world without pissing off some major players. Boat like the Impala? She'll slip right under the radar. We'll be on Crowley's doorstep 'fore he even has a chance to launch one of those temper tantrums he loves so much."

Sam coughed lightly in that annoying I-have-an-idea-you're-going-to-hate way.

"Oh for God's sake, we know you don't have a damn thing stuck in your throat, boy," Bobby snapped. "Spit it out." Dean tried his best to hide his grin in his rice, and failed miserably.

"It's just that - if we do get stopped by the Alliance tomorrow - it might be better for us to have a reason to be traveling through their blockade," Sam said. "A reason that's not just 'because we want to'."

"You mean to say..." Dean prompted, eyes narrowing.

"I mean to say, passengers," Sam clarified, meeting Dean's gaze. "Look, it's not unheard of for a model like the Impala to ferry passengers off-world. And any excuse to get past the Alliance is a good excuse. It might be worth the risk, if only for the short trip to Crowley's."

Dean chewed over his brother's words even as he chewed Bobby's cooking. Not for the first time, the fact that his brother was a damn genius was highlighted brutally for him. _Should'a let him keep on lawyering,_ that tricky voice in the back of his mind whispered, as it always did. _Should'a let him have that life you couldn't..._

"One passenger" he capitulated, setting down his chopsticks. "Maybe two, if they're a pair can't be separated. But I'm not having a damn circus on my boat."

"No circus," Sam agreed, eyes smiling even as his mouth stayed serious. "You got it."

Dean left Charlie in charge of recruiting fares the next morning. For a shy girl, she had a way with making strangers feel at home. She'd melt your heart like butter 'soon as look at you, a talent Dean had yet to grasp.

He wasn't much good for first impressions at the moment anyway. The night before had yielded next-to-no sleep, a fact he could blame mostly on the anxiety of their imminent blockade-running (though that waiter's blue eyes made an appearance or twelve every time he tried to close his own). Which meant that, as he climbed up to the cockpit, he was a very grumpy Captain indeed.

Meg was her usual acerbic self, helped by the metric ton of tea she seemed able to put away each morning. "Hey, Cap," she said. "We 'bout ready to try this thing?"

"Soon as I get the all-clear from Charlie," Dean gritted, rubbing blearily at his eyes. The cockpit was the place in the whole boat where he felt the most at home. He'd grown up flying the Impala, after all - relinquishing the reins to Meg had been a bitter act, but the woman was the most gorram talented pilot he'd ever come across. She'd gotten them out of tighter spaces than she'd gotten them into, and those were stats that were hard to argue with.

"Hear we're playing ferry-boat," she said, avoiding his gaze. "That's bound to be just a bundle of interesting."

"Let's hope not," Dean muttered.

"Hey, Cap!" a voice chirped through the com system. "We snagged ourselves a fare! Buckled in and ready to go!"

"Copy that, Charlie," he said into the com. Then, turning to Meg, he heaved a sigh. "Alright, then," he said. "Wheels-up, and let's get going."

He found Charlie moments later, checking the netting on the equipment in the cargo hold. "Where are our mysterious passengers?" he asked, joining in to help out with the last of the checks.

Charlie laughed. "It's just the one," she explained. "He seems nice, if a little quiet. Didn't have much in the way of luggage. Just wanted to get to where we're going." She straightened, remembering something. "Oh! And he paid up-front."

Dean felt a chill wash over him as he watched Charlie reach into her coverall pocket for the cash. "Up-front?" he asked.

_You don't pay nobody up-front unless you want no questions asked. _ His father's voice rang in his skull as though the old man was shouting the words in his ear. Up-front was bad. Up-front meant nothing but trouble. Up-front...

"Yep! The money's right here -" Charlie offered the cash out, looking confused when he didn't immediately take it. "Captain?"

"You hold onto that for me, okay Charlie?" She nodded. "Where's the passenger now?"

"Spare quarters," she told him. He started off in that direction, then paused -

"What's his name?"

"He only had the one," Charlie said. "He said to call him 'Castiel'."

**xXx**

He should have known.

He should have _known_.

Every cell in his body was telling him that he should be surprised - shocked - dumbfounded in this instant. And yet - Dean watched the mysterious Castiel through the open doorway to the spare quarters feeling nothing more than dull realization.

The blue-eyed waiter was on his ship.

The blue-eyed waiter was on the Impala.

There was no way in hell this was good.

Castiel - that was his name, it seemed, or at least what he wanted to be called - sat on the edge of his bed, a single duffel bag next to him. There was no other baggage, nothing else in the way of possessions. Just a man and a bag.

A man who was staring, incidentally, at Dean.

"Hello, Captain," Castiel said. The voice was exactly the same as Dean remembered it.

"What are you doing on my boat?"

The words were out of Dean's mouth before he had the chance to check them. But once they were in the open, he couldn't regret them. Payment up-front, one bag, no questions asked...

Castiel cocked his head to the side, a strangely birdlike motion on a man. "I am traveling, Captain. The same as you."

Dean snorted. "Like hell. Why does a cocktail waiter need to make tracks off-world so early in the morning?"

"Why does a Core-World dinner guest?"

Dean gritted his teeth against a wash of frustration - but even through the irritation, he couldn't miss the way the man's hands tightened on his satchel. There was something in the bag - something the man didn't want to let go.

"I chose your ship for a simple reason," Castiel informed him, his voice gentle. "I believe that you have as much interest in avoiding the Alliance as I do. No ulterior motives. I am not here to make trouble for you or your crew, especially since I suspect that you and your crew are perfectly capable of making trouble by yourselves. If you simply get me to my destination - which, incidentally, is your destination as well - you will receive twice the payment you have already received, and we can both part happy men." His head cocked again, that odd, alien motion. "Do we have a deal?"

A long silence stretched between the two. Dean studied the other man's expression, but Castiel either had the best poker face he'd ever seen, or the man just flat-out did not experience emotion. He wasn't sure which option he'd like to bet on.

"Dean?" That was Sam's voice over the comm. "You'd better get up to the bridge. Now."

"That will be the Alliance blockade," Castiel supplied calmly. "Remember my offer, Captain. And do what you will."

**xXx**

Sam looked at Dean like he was crazy when Dean gabbled out a "shutupSammydon'ttellthem -" as soon as he arrived, breathless, at the bridge.

"Dean -" he started, but Dean cut him off.

"Not - don't tell 'em about the passenger. I need to talk to you all about him first."

"The cruiser's hailing us, Dean. What do we do in the meantime?"

Dean fastened on his most brilliant smile. "Come on, Sammy. What's that Winchester charm for, if you're not conning law enforcement?"

It took the better part of twenty minutes (and some fairly obvious double entendres) to convince the young Alliance officer to let the Impala through the barricade. By the time they bid their farewells, the officer's gigantic ears were beet red, and Dean's face hurt from forced smiling.

"See?" he said to Sam, switching off the video display. "Works every time."

But Sam was already on the comm. "Crew meeting," he ordered. "Bridge. Now."

Two minutes later, Bobby, Charlie, and Bela had all joined Meg, Sam, and Dean up on the bridge. Meg pulled up CCTV footage of the spare quarters, and the crew watched as Castiel paced quietly in his allotted rooms.

"He looks so clean," Meg observed, quirking an eyebrow. "Cute... but clean."

"And he was at the gala last night?" Bela asked. "We can't trust him." Her tone was light and crisp, but the force behind her words was unmistakeable. "He obviously wants less to do with the Alliance than we do. Having him aboard this ship is tantamount to painting a target on the side of the Impala and begging to be used as shooting practice."

"Which we're pretty much doing already," drawled Meg. "Teacakes is right." For such a small woman, she took up a helluva lot of space, propping her boots up on the console and leaning back in her chair. Without seeming to pay it much attention, she tossed a gleaming switchblade from hand to hand in complicated whirls and twists. _ It helps my dexterity_, she'd once told Dean with a smile as deadly as the blade itself. Dean wasn't sure he'd believed her, but the habit sure as hell kept him from backseat driving.

"This guy's something else," Meg continued as the switchblade danced. "You can see it in the way he moves. Probably Alliance. High ranking. He's on his way to the outer planets? Either he pissed someone off, or he's going after someone who pissed _him_ off." She shrugged. "Either way, we get caught someplace we don't want to be in a beautiful little shit-storm."

Dean groaned, rubbing a hand over his face. "_Tah Ma Duh._.." he muttered.

"Charlie? What do you think?"

That was Sam's measured voice, breaking in over the static that threatened to overwhelm Dean's brain. Telling his headache to _just hold on a gorram minute_, Dean glanced over at the mechanic.

The woman looked up at Sam over the top of one of those antique Earth-That-Was comic books she was always collecting. "Me?" she squeaked.

Meg snorted, and Dean briefly reconsidered his no-throwing-crew-out-the-airlock rule.

"As long as everyone's bitching," he said with a glare to the pilot, "might as well hear what you think on the matter." There was something about the young mechanic that brought out his big-brother overprotective side, and the way that Meg and Bela sometimes ran roughshod over her rankled like nothing else. "You're the smartest one in most rooms, anyhow. So. Yes or no on our squeaky-clean Alliance-bait?"

Charlie lowered the comic book, blushing at the sudden attention. "Uh," she stammered, glancing around the room. Bela was watching her with the casual disinterest usually reserved for cats observing the pathetic struggles of cornered rodents, while Meg's stare was characteristically fever-bright and hungry. Charlie visibly wilted.

An over-sized hand landed on her shoulder. Charlie looked up into Bobby's grizzled face. He gave her a barely-perceptible smile, before moving back to lean against the wall.

"I, uh, never was much of a one for reading people," Charlie faltered. "Always thought machines just plain made more sense. But that man - Castiel - he seems broken, but not bad. Like maybe there's a couple'a screws loose, but he's running just the best that he can." She smiled, a sunny thing that could have blinded a stadium's worth of people. "And hell, we've all got some screws loose to be here, right?"

Dean found himself losing the battle against his grin. "That's a point and a half," he said gruffly. "Bobby?"

"Aw hell, boy, don't you drag me into this," the older man said. "I just work here."

"You're a grumpy old man, you know that?"

"So your daddy told me," Bobby mumbled.

"Sam?" Dean turned to his brother expectantly.

"He hasn't tried to hurt us yet..." Sam began slowly. His eyes were fixed on the CCTV footage as though he was mesmerized. "And God knows we're not best friends with the Alliance anyway. Even so... there's something familiar about him, Dean."

Dean's eyes narrowed. "Familiar-good, or familiar-bad?"

Sam shrugged. "Just familiar. Like there's something that should be ringing a bell in my head, but it isn't."

"Well that's not ominous at all," Bela muttered.

"I say he stays 'til we reach Crowley's hideout," Sam said definitively. "That's my vote."

"Two for letting the nerdy clean guy stay, and two for throwing him into space," Meg observed. "Tie-breaking vote's yours, Cap."

The figure on the screen seemed to quiver and grow in front of Dean's eyes as he studied it. Something about Sammy's words was ringing in his skull - the man looked familiar. _Sure_, his rational inner voice reasoned, _the guy's from Helios. Sam probably played baccarat with him or some other fancy-pants game when he was still at school..._

But it was more than that. Something about this Castiel seemed familiar to Dean as well. Something about the way he moved, like Meg had said, or the way he'd looked at Dean - looked _through_ Dean - as though he was nothing more than a blip on his radar screen...

_Operative_...

The word whispered in the back of Dean's mind, calling up memories (_fire, screaming, Mama, Mama, Mama_) he'd rather die than confront.

But no. The Operatives were just myths - horror stories - dreamed up by the Alliance. Super-soldiers with no emotion, no remorse - single-minded in their crusade for A Better Society. And even if they were real - even if this Castiel really was one of them - why would he be running from the Alliance cruise ships? Surely he could just hitch a ride without having to rely on smugglers and scavengers (who were, Dean would be the first to admit, notoriously unreliable).

"He stays."

For the second time in an hour, Dean spoke without realizing it. He blinked, realized what he'd said, then repeated the words. "He stays. For now. Until Crowley's."

A collective sigh - relief? Disappointment? - ran through the cabin as the crew members began to disperse. Bobby was the last to leave, pausing at Dean's shoulder to mutter, "Hope you know what you're doing, boy."

Dean shot him a wan smile as the image of those blue eyes flashed in his mind once more. "Me too, Bobby. Me too."


	2. Chapter 2

"Meg and Bela are sparring."

It was the sentence that was guaranteed to get Dean out of his bunk every time.

He grinned up at Charlie, whose head was sticking upside-down through the porthole to his room. "Angry or fun?"

"Does it matter?"

"I'll be right there."

It could be considered real pervy, Dean thought as he clambered up the ladder, but he enjoyed watching Meg and Bela pound on each other. Two attractive women doing their best to knock the shit out of one another... any man with a modicum of appreciation for the female form would be on-board.

But to be honest, that wasn't what drew Dean to the cargo floor. Bela and Meg had a long-standing tradition of attempting to knock the other one out. He'd gotten over his "ooh-baby" fixation a long, long time ago. Now, he scrambled for the hold because of the fact that watching Bela and Meg go at it was fascinating and impressive as hell.

He wasn't disappointed. The two women obviously hadn't been fighting long by the time he drew up beside Charlie at the railing. Meg had a split lip, and Bela was favoring her left side, but they were still going strong.

He glanced to his right and snorted. Bobby and Sam were watching the pair below, their feet propped up on an old feed sack. Bobby had actually made popcorn.

"Odds?" Dean muttered to Charlie. She grinned.

"Bobby thinks Bela's got a better shot tonight," she muttered back at him, "but I've got a feeling about Meg. She makes a habit of coming outta nowhere."

Dean quirked a smile. Charlie's "feelings" about things like this were not to be mistrusted.

Below, Meg and Bela circled one another, Bela's footwork as fancy as Meg's was simple. It hadn't taken long after Bela had joined the crew before the pair of them had realized that their misplaced aggression was far better taken out on one another than it would be on anyone else. Dean had nearly kicked the two of them off the boat the first time they'd come back to him all busted up, but Meg had talked him out of it. Now their sparring matches were regular entertainment.

Bela feinted left and swung right, a ploy Meg dodged easily. The taller woman had trained with some of the most accomplished masters on the Core, a fact she never let the other members of the crew forget. "Discipline, darling," she was fond of reminding Dean (frequently as she wiped the floor with him). "You'll never achieve anything without discipline."

Meg had received no such training, but that didn't stop her from matching Bela blow for blow. The pilot had a suicidal streak that scared the shit outta Dean - her strategy was to take every punch and kick directed her way, and to serve it back double. It seemed to work in her favor, if the semi-fanatic gleam in her eye was anything to go by.

Bela spun and landed a particularly tricky side-kick, and Bobby and Sam started clapping. "Kick her ass!" Bobby whooped, tossing popcorn down at the pair below.

But Meg was already making her comeback, sweeping Bela's leg out from underneath her and launching herself onto the other woman's back. Bela went down with a whoosh of breath, landing a strategically placed elbow to Meg's ribs in the process. But Meg either didn't feel it or didn't care, grabbing Bela's wrist and wrenching it up behind her back in the same motion.

"What do you say?" she gritted between her clenched teeth, a terrifying grin spread over her lips.

"Yield," Bela panted. "I yield."

"That's what I thought."

Meg clambered off Bela's back and extended a hand, helping the other woman to her feet. Dean couldn't help but join in the applause from Bobby, Sam, and Charlie up on the catwalk.

"Outta nowhere," Dean muttered.

"That's what I said," Charlie affirmed.

But the champion wasn't watching her approving audience. Instead, Meg's eyes were fixed on the entrance to the spare bunks. Following her gaze, Dean saw Castiel standing soldier-straight in the doorway.

"You like what you see, Blue-Eyes?" Meg asked in that heightened faux-seductive way of hers. "Want to try me on for size?"

Castiel blinked at her, seemingly uncomprehending. "Your bravery is very impressive," he said, and Dean felt something prickle at the back of his neck. "And your technique is equally so," Castiel continued, speaking to Bela. "But no. Thank you."

"You don't spar?" That was Bela, pushing strands of sweat-soaked hair out of her eyes.

"I do," the man replied. "But I am cautious in selecting my partners."

"Is that so?" Bela's eyes were fiery, flirtatious, dangerous. "And is there anyone here you would deign to 'select'?"

There was a long moment - and Dean could have sworn that Castiel's eyes darted towards the catwalk.

"No."

That gravelly voice blazed straight down Dean's spine. He shot to his feet. "I'm going to bed," he muttered to a wide-eyed Charlie. "Thanks for the heads-up."

He felt Castiel's gaze between his shoulder blades all the way into his dreams.

**xXx**

"_Mama!"_

"_Mary! Oh God... Mary!"_

_Flames, licking at the walls, the windows, the ceiling._

_Mama, lifeless on the ground, a hole in her chest where no person should have a hole. One arm stretched out towards Sammy's cradle, the other flung across her stomach._

_The Shadow Man. Standing. Staring at - staring through Dean. His gaze locked up Dean's throat tight. He couldn't even breathe._

_Sammy, screaming in his crib._

"_Dean!"_

_Sammy was being pressed into Dean's arms. Dean blinked - once - up into Dad's teary face. "Take your brother outside as fast as you can," he ordered - a soldier's voice, a soldier's manner, autopilot for the grief-stricken. "Now, Dean!" he shouted when Dean hesitated._

_The Shadow Man was gone. Dean clutched Sammy to his chest, struggling to subdue his brother's flailing limbs._

_The last thing he saw before the roof of the room came down in flames was his father, standing over Mama's still body -_

_Then everything went yellow and orange and white -_

**xXx**

"Models like the Impala typically have autopilot mechanisms, do they not?"

Dean just barely stopped himself from grabbing his Colt and letting a solid three shots off at the speaker. Instead, he clutched the arms of Meg's chair hard enough to set the leather creaking and gritted his teeth against the rush of panic.

"Jesus, man," he exclaimed to the unruffled Castiel. "Don't you make noise?"

"Not as a rule," Castiel replied, moving up the final steps to the bridge on cloud-quiet feet.

"Well... you should," Dean said lamely, forcing himself to release the arms of the chair. "And yeah, she's on autopilot now. Meg'll set a course before she turns in for the night, and all that's left is for her to follow it." He finally gathered his thoughts around him and squinted up at the other man. "You shouldn't be up here, by the way."

"So you are keeping watch over the navigation system?" Castiel asked, completely ignoring that last thought of Dean's.

"No, I just -" Dean started, then broke off, scrubbing a hand across his face.

"Oh," Castiel said, realization smoothing the furrow from between his eyebrows. "I begin to understand."

He moved a few steps closer to the console, his eyes fixed on the endless stars on the other side of the windows. "What were you dreaming about?" he asked.

His tone was noncommittal, uninterested, but Dean found himself tensing nonetheless. "What?" he asked, for lack of a better response.

"In my experience, when people find their sleep disturbed by nightmares or other unpleasant thoughts, they seek comfort in stability and familiarity. Some eat high-calorie, low-nutrition foods. Others will view old films. You return to the place on this ship where you feel the most at ease." He cocked his head in that weird-ass way of his. "Am I correct in assuming that you grew up aboard the Impala?"

Dean was gripping the arms of the chair again. "None of your damn business," he grumbled. "You shouldn't be up here. No passengers on the bridge."

"My apologies if I've offended you," Castiel said, and for some reason, Dean found himself biting back a reassurance. _ Anyone else, you'd'a decked 'em by now_, a voice whispered in the back of his mind. _This guy's spoken twenty words to you, and you're already handing out 'It's okay's. _

Resigning himself to the fact that he was going soft in his old age, Dean shrugged reluctantly. "'S okay," he muttered. And he could have been mistaken, but that looked like relief in the other man's eyes.

"I don't intend to anger you," Castiel said, and it seemed as though he was talking mostly to himself. "I simply sometimes... do not know what is and is not appropriate."

The bridge was good-sized, but the four metal walls felt awfully close in this moment with this man and this man's blue eyes. Dean swallowed. His throat was dryer than it should have been.

"Well it ain't appropriate for you to be up here," he rasped finally. "No passengers on the bridge. Like I said." He coughed, just once. "Anyway, you better catch some shut-eye. We'll be landing on Sundown in a few hours, and you wanna be fresh for the next part of your... trip."

"Of course." Castiel nodded in that curiously precise way of his. "Thank you, Captain. And goodnight." He made for the door, and Dean had to ignore the way his stomach twisted slightly at the forlorn look on the other man's face.

"Hey, Cas -" the nickname slipped out before Dean had a chance to check himself. "What do you do when you have nightmares? Where do you go?"

The man didn't turn to face him as he replied. "I don't have nightmares," he replied, his tone even flatter than usual. "I do not dream."

And with that, he was onto the catwalk and out of Dean's sight.

**xXx**

The Impala had her feet on the ground in Sundown for less than five minutes before Dean realized that Castiel had made his escape. He couldn't say that was much in the way of a shocker - the man hadn't seemed like much of the goodbye-ing kind. But still...

"Castiel's gone," he commented to Sam. The two were loading up their ground transport, a closed-top little three-wheel vehicle that could just about fit four people (or three, if one of those people was Sammy and his freakishly long legs).

Sam shrugged. "Charlie said he was out the loading bay soon as Meg had us planet-bound," he said. The nylon straps creaked under his mammoth hands as he winched them tight. "Figured that'd be fine with you. What with the payment up-front and everything."

"Mm." It wasn't an agreement, but it wasn't an argument either. They finished up fastening the last crate and Dean stepped back, flexing his hands to loosen the cramped muscles.

It took him a moment to notice the scrutinizing bitchface his brother had aimed in his direction. "What?" he snapped.

"You didn't want to... say _goodbye_ or anything, did you?" he asked.

"Aw, come on Sammy -"

"'Cuz you know as well as I do that guy wasn't quite right with the Alliance." Sam scoffed at Dean's eye-roll. "And yeah, I do see the hypocrisy there, but Dean -" and here he put on his Serious Face - "- no government blocks off a major trading planet for twelve hours because a necklace goes missing. The fact that Castiel wanted to ghost out of there -"

"Sam -"

"- whoever he is - whatever he has - it's not something we want in our laps."

"Jesus, Sammy, would you stow the lecture?"

Dean hadn't meant to yell, but the cargo hold carried sound like nobody's business. Within a second, Bobby was leaning out over the railing, cap pushed back over his forehead. "What's going on down there?" he wanted to know. "I gotta come break anything up?"

"No," Sam said, looking chagrined.

"Sam's just being a little bitch," Dean said.

"Jerk," Sam grumbled.

"_Captain_ Jerk," Dean clarified. "And as for the Castiel issue -"

"There's a Castiel issue?" Bobby was coming down the stairs now, all alarm and concern.

"- there_ isn't_ one," Dean finished, glaring at both Sam and Bobby. "The guy got himself out of our hair, and if what you're guessing is true, Sammy - _and I'm not saying it's not_ - I'm all eternally grateful. But holy mother of God, he ain't anywhere near here, so let's go ahead and stop talking about him."

"Trouble in Winchester paradise?" That crisp voice was Bela, strolling up from her bunk with the laconic air of someone who was not about to perform a highly illegal trade of stolen goods. As ever, she was dressed to the nines - the lines of her leather jacket were tailored and clean, her hair pinned back in perfect waves.

The strained silence between the two brothers was answer enough, but Bobby chipped in anyway. "No such thing," he grated.

"You boys sure you don't want some help from little ol' me?" Meg climbed down the ladder from the bridge, shrugging into her own leather jacket. "Me'n Crowley go way back, after all."

"Yeah, and the last time you saw him, you tried to bite his ear off," Sam reminded her.

Meg shrugged. "He has a motormouth on him," she said. "I wanted to shut him up."

**xXx**

Meg and Charlie took the transpo into market, ready to load up on the supplies they'd need for the next step of their trip. This left Sam, Bela, and Dean to make their way to Crowley's mansion on-foot. Dean arrived sweaty, dusty, and even grumpier than he had been after Castiel's unceremonious departure.

On any Core planet, the crime lord's house wouldn't have been considered above average, but here on Sundown? It was the fucking Taj Mahal. There was even a butler to greet them at the door and escort them to Crowley's study.

"I'll never get used to this," Dean muttered to Sam, who huffed in agreement.

"Quiet, children," Bela hissed out of the corner of her mouth, her tense expression sliding easily to enthusiastic greeting as the door to the study was opened. "Mr. Crowley," she exclaimed, as though reunited with a long-lost friend. "Wonderful to see you again."

"Ms. Talbot, I swear, you get lovelier each time I see you."

Crowley stood behind his large mahogany desk, both hands outstretched in welcome. He wasn't a large man - in fact, he was on the shorter side of average, with thinning hair and a rounded stomach. But there was something in his bright, dark eyes that sparked with danger and cunning - something that Dean had long-since learned was not to be underestimated.

"You're a flatterer," Bela countered, sinking into a chair across from Crowley. Dean and Sam continued standing, staring at the other man.

"What about us?" Dean asked. "Ain't I lovelier than the last time?"

"Charming as ever, Captain Winchester," Crowley deadpanned. "Won't you sit?"

Dean slid into the proffered chair with reluctance, relaxing only slightly as he sensed Sam take up position at his back. His shoulders were tense. Every hand-off with Crowley always ended in a clash - Dean in no way expected this to be any sort of different.

"The necklace," Bela said, taking a velvet drawstring bag out of her pocket and laying it gently on the table. "As requested."

"Wonderful." Crowley grabbed a bag of his own from behind the desk and slid it across the surface towards her. "And payment. As requested."

Dean stared blankly at the bag for a long moment. "That's it?" he finally mustered.

"I'm sure I don't know what you mean."

"No haggling? No 'you chaps should've got it to me ten hours ago, pip-pip, cheerio'?"

"I don't actually talk like that. And I don't know where you've gotten such a low opinion of our dealings. Why would I possibly want to throw a wrench when we've got such a good thing going?"

"Uh, I dunno, maybe 'cuz our pilot tried to give you three new ear-holes the last time you saw her," Dean supplied helpfully. He couldn't miss the way Crowley's eyes narrowed.

"Meg," he said, voice arsenic-sweet. "How is the little firecracker? I do so yearn to see her again."

"Crowley." Sam's eyes were serious, assessing. "What's your game?"

With a sigh, Crowley flipped open the display on his desk, pulling up a news-feed. "Alliance chatter from Helios," he said. "And none of the men-in-blue idiot superficial nonsense. This is the deep dark - the stuff only the higher-ups know, the stuff that scares them so much they fill those tailored trousers of theirs." He cocked his head at the trio. "Jewelry wasn't the only thing that disappeared from that museum the night you made your little play. Something else grew legs and went walkabout, and I'd like to know what it was."

"I'm sure you would," Bela said.

"Careful with that tone, Ms. Talbot," Crowley cautioned. "I'm not fully convinced that your sticky fingers aren't the ones responsible. You do have a history of taking toys from others."

"What's this got to do with us?" Dean asked bluntly. "You've got your necklace. We've got our payment. What are you trying to ask, Crowley?"

"Isn't it obvious, Squirrel? I want to know what's got the big bad Alliance scared so completely," Crowley said, leaning across his desk. The blue light from the newsfeed gave his features a gaunt, eerie glow. "Something that boots-quake-ingly powerful... well, it'd be worth a pretty penny if I could get my hands on it. So I'd like to put you on retainer. Track the thing down. Bring it to me, if possible. Believe me, I'll make it worth your while."

"Why us?" Dean wanted to know.

"Because you were at Ground Zero when it went missing," Crowley explained. "Seems to me, that makes you uniquely qualified to track its progress across the 'verse."

"You don't even know what it is. What makes you think we'd be able to find something that mysterious."

"They call it the Angel Tablet."

"I've never heard of such an artifact," Bela scoffed.

"I'd say that's rather the point, my dear," Crowley said. "No one has. And yet the fact that it's missing... well. It's making some waves."

When Dean's expression did not change, Crowley slid another bag across the table towards him. "I'll give you an advance. As a sign of faith."

"Cash up front." Dean didn't have to turn around to know that Sam's mouth was quirked in a wry smile. "Always a good sign."

"What do you say, Captain?" Crowley asked, eyes locked on Dean's. "Will you help make me - and yourselves, incidentally - quite disgustingly rich?"

**xXx**

"You annoy me."

"You're not telling me anything I didn't know."

"You _annoy_ me."

Bela was glaring at Dean. Dean, in turn, was glaring down at the surface of his drink.

"Go talk to some booze about it," he suggested.

"That was a blank check, Dean. Crowley was offering us a blank check to do nothing. And you turned it down." Bela shook her head, a tight, frustrated gesture. "Sometimes I wonder if you have any business sense at all."

"I do," Dean retorted. "Just not business sense that'll end up with me strung up in a junker headed straight into a sun because I didn't turn in the results Crowley wanted."

Bela continued to glare at him.

"You annoy me," she repeated.

"Yeah, yeah."

Bela headed towards the door with a huff of exasperation as Dean drained the last of his whiskey and flagged the bartender for another. He'd been good today, getting paid for a heist well-executed and showing moral fortitude in the face of temptation by turning down Crowley's dangerous offer with a flat "hell, no." He deserved a drink. Or twelve.

"A mechanic? Wow."

Dean kept one ear cocked towards the conversation at his right as he sipped at his whiskey. Charlie was leaning back against the bar, some brightly colored beverage in her hands as she worked on (literally) charming the pants off a pretty young local girl.

"Been working on machines since I was pint-sized," Charlie said with an air of well-practiced nonchalance. "Guess you could say that I'm... real good with my hands."

"Oh wow," the girl said, swaying closer. Dean buried a snort in his drink. Charlie aimed a surreptitious kick his way.

"Show me any broken thing," Charlie continued, ignoring the muffled laughter of her captain, "and I promise you that I'll have her purring along in minutes. Smooth... warm... as butter."

The local girl practically melted. Never let it be said that Charlie Bradbury did not have game.

Speaking of game - Meg and Sam were engaging in a particularly fearsome darts match at the far end of the dive. It seemed like a contest to see who could Robin Hood the most of the other one's darts. With their perfect hand-eye coordination, it was getting mighty crowded in the bullseye.

It was the right decision to turn down Crowley, wasn't it? Dean grimaced, taking another sip and hoping that the liquor would burn away some of his uncertainty. Even if they came up empty-handed, they'd still be able to get a few months of quality pay out of Crowley before they had to disappear. And avoiding the crime lord wouldn't be easy, but it'd be do-able.

But Dean had a sneaking suspicion that finding the whatever-it-was and turning it over to Crowley would also involve turning Castiel over to Crowley... and gorramit if that thought didn't just sour his stomach.

"Hello, Dean."

Maybe he was getting a bit psychic, because no sooner had the thought of Castiel crossed his mind than the man was standing at his side.

Dean nearly spilled his whiskey, twitching back in surprise.

"Cas, what the hell?" He took in the other man's appearance - disheveled, wild-eyed... was that a bruise starting to form along his cheekbone? "What happened -"

"There's no time," Castiel cut him off, his voice low. As of yet, no one else in the bar seemed to have noticed him, but Dean knew that wouldn't last long. "I need your help."

Dean could have sworn that someone dumped a bucket of ice over him, the way his skin chilled. "How did you find me here?"

Castiel shot him a deadpan look. The implication was clear. I could find you anywhere. The chill beneath Dean's skin intensified. "Is your business on this planet concluded?" he wanted to know.

"Why -"

"I would like to book passage off-world. At your earliest convenience." A long pause as he scanned Dean's expression. "Please."

"Castiel -"

"You called me 'Cas' earlier."

"Slip of the tongue. Castiel... I don't know what you're bound up in, but I can't -"

Both of the bar's front doors flew inwards at the same time, and the sun was blocked out by two columns of uniformed Alliance soldiers, who marched in perfect time onto the barroom floor. This was a disturbance the bar patrons could not ignore. Most froze in their tracks. Several more (Dean included) began eyeing the room for potential exits... or failing that, potential weapons. One woman ducked under her table.

There was a long moment as the soldiers fanned out around the room, covering all entrances and exits. Dean couldn't see any weapons, but he didn't doubt that any quick moves would have him dead before he could make a his big heroic stand.

Into the silence walked a man - tall, handsome, and absolutely terrifying. He moved into the dive as though he owned it, taking in his surroundings with a kind of benign fascination that seemed unnatural on the face of one so young.

His eyes lit up when he saw Castiel, a delighted smile suffusing his face. "Castiel," he said, voice low and warm.

Dean shifted closer to Charlie, putting himself between her and the interloper. Charlie, in turn, put a steadying hand on his shoulder. "I'm okay," she whispered to Dean. "Don't do anything stupid."

The strange man closed the distance between the door and Castiel in a few long strides. "We've been looking for you for hours," he said. "You gave us the slip this morning. We just want to talk with you."

Castiel hadn't taken his eyes off of Dean. They burned into him - not pleading, not desperate, just assessing, scraping bits off of Dean's soul and running them through the calibrator in his head. Whatever he discovered seemed to make sense to him. Castiel gave him a terse nod and turned back to face the man.

"I did not appreciate the manner in which you invited me to 'talk'," Castiel said, his gesture taking in his bruised cheek. "Conversations, in my experience, include far fewer punches."

The strange man shook his head in awed dismay. "I had known you to be far more reasonable than this, Castiel."

Castiel cocked his head. "Then you barely know me at all, Michael."

The man - _Michael_ - narrowed his eyes, and for a moment, Dean thought he was going to introduce the whole bar to his manner of "conversation". "All right," he said, stepping forward. "Let's take an itty-bitty moment before we start breaking the furniture. Okay?"

"Dean," he heard Charlie mutter behind him, "this is a stupid thing..."

"'Dean'," Michael echoed, his unnerving dark eyes on Dean now. "Dean... Winchester?" He laughed, a beautiful, clear, ringing peal. "You have thrown in your lot with Dean Winchester, of all people? Castiel, he will kill you the moment he learns what you are."

"Nobody has to kill anybody here today," Dean said, moving until he was square in between Castiel and Michael.

"Are you certain?" Michael asked. His head was tilted in a disconcerting echo of Castiel's. "I wonder what your beloved father - what your poor _mother_ - would feel about you throwing in your lot with an Operative?"

The words hung in the air, and Dean waited for them to land. But the punch of impact never arrived. _Already knew_, he marveled quietly. _Sometimes I'm so smart I'm like to cut myself_.

"Well they're dead," he said with a swagger he didn't feel. "So they're not saying much of anything. Me, on the other hand - well, I don't take kindly to dicks."

And with that he hauled off and punched Michael straight across his perfect jaw.

It hurt like hell. Hurt worse than hell. And what was worse, Michael didn't look like anything much had happened to him at all. Instead, he gazed down at Dean, all benevolence and mercy... then turned to the nearest Alliance officer and murmured -

"Kill them."

- and then -

- and then -

Well, everything got a little bit crazy.

Dean wasn't the type of fellow to wait around for the chopping block. He shouldered the officer aside, grabbing Charlie. He half-expected to be gunned down as he ran... but then, he hadn't anticipated the hurricane that was Castiel.

The man wasn't fluid, wasn't graceful. He was calculated, determined, drilled. Above all else, he was strong. Like Michael, he could take a punch without blinking (and he took many punches from the Alliance soldiers that tried to pile on top of him). He fought like a machine. It was terrifying. It was fucking _awesome_.

Sometime over the course of the brawl, Meg had thrown herself into the fray, her feral grin flashing. Dean gave a mental shrug - the woman could never resist the chance to spill Alliance blood. A closer look revealed that she was using her darts as knives, clutching them between her fingers and stabbing wildly. _Jesus Christ._

"Dean!" Sam shouted to his brother over the din.

"Let's get out of here," Dean shouted back. He wrapped his arm around Charlie and the three of them were making for the door when -

Charlie went _down_.

That was Michael, who had grabbed the back of the mechanic's jumpsuit and _hauled_. Charlie dropped with a cry that was more of alarm than of pain, and Michael squared off with Dean across her body.

"Son of a bitch," Dean muttered. _Nobody_ messed with Charlie and got away with it, not on Dean's watch. But the prospect of getting his ass handed to him by this super-man was not appealing. _Aw, hell_, he thought. Out of options, he drew back his fist -

"Ah!" Michael exclaimed, clutching at his leg. Charlie had buried a screwdriver into the muscle of his calf with all her might, and while it might have been no more than a bee-sting to the man, Dean knew that bee-stings could hurt plenty in the right place. "You little -"

And that was when Sam landed the right cross that laid Michael out cold.

The stranger sat on the floor, blinking dazedly up at Sam, obviously feeling every centimeter of the bruise that was about to bloom across his chin. "But - how -" he stammered... and Dean was pleased to see a hint of _fear_ cross his features. Sam, in turn, was staring down at his own fist as though it was made out of dynamite.

"C'mon." Dean wasn't about to sit around and wait for Michael to get his feet underneath him. He grabbed Charlie off the ground and hustled her to the door. "Go," he said.

"Captain?"

"I'll meet you back at the Impala," he told her.

"What about you?"

Dean caught a glimpse of Castiel barreling through a line of Alliance soldiers. "The Impala," he ordered. "_Go_."

And then he was fighting for his life. Occasionally he caught a glimpse of Meg or Sam or Castiel. Michael seemed to have vanished from the chaos. Maybe he should have paid more attention to his surroundings and less to searching for his friends, because all of a sudden he was at the bottom of an Alliance pile-up, solider's bodies pressing down above him, pinning him to the floor, squeezing the breath out of him -

"Dean!" he heard someone shouting his name, but he couldn't tell if it was Sam, Meg, or even Cas. Hard to hear -

The pressure was lifted. Blinking open his eyes, Dean saw soldiers being forcibly hauled into the air and tossed across the room... by Cas. "What in the hell -" he muttered, but Cas was gripping his shoulder tight, raising him to his feet.

"You have to get out of here, Captain," Cas told him, voice steady and grave, a strange contrast to the chaos of their surroundings.

"Cas -"

But he never even got to finish that thought before a beer bottle came down over his head and everything went black.

**xXx**

"What if he doesn't wake up?"

The voice was Charlie's, anxious and kind. The snort that followed was obviously Bobby's.

"He'll wake up," came the gruff man's voice. "That boy's come back from more lumps on the head than any man oughta."

"I can hear you," Dean rasped. His eyes fluttered open, then closed again as bright light seared into his retinas. "Jesus Christ, somebody turn on the flood lamps?"

"Don't be such a baby." And that was Sam, caring as always. "Here."

Somebody pressed a glass of water into his hand, and Dean took a sip. By the time he finished the glass, he felt up to peeling back his eyelids again.

The first thing he saw was Cas's face.

"Operative," he croaked.

There was a slight tightening in the man's lips. Aside from that, his expression remained stoney.

"You an Alliance-patsy?"

"No."

Meg snorted. "I find that a little hard to believe."

"I've spent the better part of our acquaintance actively _avoiding_ the Alliance," Cas pointed out. Dean bit back a smile.

"Your name really Castiel?"

"What do you think?"

"I think that's _Go_ _shi. _Who was that Michael guy?"

A long moment. Dean watched the bob of Cas's Adam's apple with a curious sort of floating detachment. "My superior," he finally rumbled.

"And what does he want with you?"

A muscle jumped in the other man's jaw as he clenched his lips closed around the answer. Dean sat up with an exasperated huff. "We ferried your ass away from a crime scene, lied to and got beaten up by Alliance officials, and now we're your taxi yet again." He swayed closer, and Castiel's eyes flicked to his. "If you don't break this ungrateful shit streak soon... I will give you an in-depth tour of the air lock." That muscle looked about ready to pop out of the man's head, he was clenching his teeth so hard. Dean decided to play a guessing game he was pretty sure he'd win. "This about the Angel Tablet?"

Cas's eyes widened in shock, which made Dean far more satisfied than he ought to be. "You stole it, didn't you. Mind telling us what it does?"

Again, nothing. "You gone mute, boy?" Bobby rumbled, halfway between curious and menacing. Castiel just looked at the ground.

"Take him to his bunk," Dean said, feeling a wave of exhaustion sweep through him. "And make sure he doesn't sneak out. Please." With a nod, Bobby hauled Castiel up, and he and Meg bundled him off towards the guest quarters.

"We've gotta go to ground, lie low," Sam muttered to Dean as soon as the trio was out of sight. "Soon. Now."

Dean blinked at his brother, remembering - did Sam really lay Michael out with one punch, when a blow from Dean had only annoyed the man? That was a troubling thought for another time. "We know anyone in range?"

"Yeah," Sam said. "And I told Meg to plot a course. But you're not gonna like it."

His heart sank in his chest. "Why? Where we going?"

"Lawrence, Dean. We're going home."


	3. Chapter 3

"_Take your brother outside as fast as you can!"_

_Flames, everywhere, fire, burning as red as the blood spreading across his mother's stomach._

_Dean stared, transfixed._

"_NOW, DEAN!"_

His face hit the floor _hard_ as he flailed himself awake so spastically that he threw himself off his bunk. He landed with a yelp that he would swear up and down he never uttered.

"Sonuva_bitch_," Dean swore, hauling himself into a sitting position and rubbing at his tender cheekbone. His heart was still racing - his t-shirt was soaked through with sweat around the collar and the armpits. He grimaced, pulling the damp material away from his skin. _ Gorram fantastic._

Third day in a row having that dream, and it wasn't getting any less terrifying. Now that was an unsettling thought. Dean had worked hard to push that memory to the back of his brain for twenty-odd years. That was twenty years of shying away from those screams, from the engulfing flames... from images of his mother. Twenty years of successfully burying his childhood... twenty years of avoiding...

There was no way he'd be getting back to sleep after that nightmare-scape. Resigning himself to another sleepless night on the bridge, Dean pulled on a clean(ish) shirt and clambered up the ladder to the catwalk.

He paused before he got to the bridge, his train of thought pulling in to the next station. Three times in as many nights he'd been forced to relive that hellish memory. And what was different about his life now? What had changed in the last three days?

Maybe the bridge wasn't where he needed to be to find some peace of mind right now.

It seemed to Dean as though he'd blinked and arrived up outside of Castiel's quarters. He had very little recollection of actually winding his way through the Impala to get to his destination - little recollection of actually making to decision to see the mysterious Operative. But here he was, hand raised to knock on the door -

But Cas wasn't alone.

There were two voices rumbling quietly inside Cas's rooms - two men. One was Castiel - there was no mistaking his whiskey-glass baritone - and the other...

_Sammy?_

What the hell was Sam doing paying Cas a late-night visit? Bobby had volunteered to sit up with the guy, make sure he didn't make any more trouble than he'd already made. But that was definitely his brother inside with Cas. Had he relieved Bobby? Had Bobby asked him to take over?

His curiosity getting the best of him, Dean leaned his ear closer to the door. The Impala being the well-made beauty that she was, Dean could only make out a few fragments of the conversation, but it was enough.

"... just went down, like I'd hit him with a lead pipe." That was Sam, his tone agitated. "And you saw him when Dean punched him - it barely fazed the guy."

"I saw nothing out of the ordinary," Cas replied, and even without seeing his face, Dean could tell that the man was lying.

So could Sam, apparently, because Dean heard his snort loud and clear. "That's _Yi Da Tuo Da Bian_, and you know it. Castiel. Why could I take on Michael when Dean couldn't? What's -" his voice broke, and Dean's breath caught in his throat. "What's wrong with me?"

"There's nothing wrong with you." Cas's response was fierce and raw, and Dean felt a rush of gratitude sweep through him. "Nothing."

"Then what -"

"Mr. Winchester -"

"It's Sam."

"Sam. I know this is confusing... I understand. But I need to ask something of you."

"What?"

"Forget all about it."

Dean knew his brother well enough to picture the puzzled look that must be on his face as vividly as though he'd been standing right in front of him. "But -" he heard Sam protest.

"No." Cas didn't let him get another word out. "Put those questions to rest. If you try to seek answers... you will not like what you uncover. And you will get those you love hurt or killed in the process."

It sounded as though Castiel was speaking from experience. But letting questions go unanswered was never Sammy's style, and Dean figured he'd better make his presence known before Sam did something to piss Cas off even further.

He knocked, sliding the door open without waiting for an answer. Inside, he found Castiel sitting cross-legged on his pallet, Sam paused in the act of agitated pacing in front of him.

"Captain," Cas greeted him calmly, looking up at him as though he hadn't just been stopped in the act of concealing important information from his companion.

"Hiya, Sammy. Cas." Dean leaned in the door frame, fixing his brother with a penetrating look. "Am I interrupting anything?"

"No," Sam said shortly.

"Great," Dean said, pointedly ignoring his brother's tone. "Hey, do me a favor? See what we got to eat in the kitchen for our guest. I'd like to have a quick chat with him."

Sam's bitchface was a sight to behold. "Dean -"

"Please." It wasn't a plea. It was an order. Sam huffed a breath and marched past Dean, out into the cargo hold.

Cas continued to gaze up at Dean, blue eyes calm. "My understanding of social cues is sadly limited," he said, "but isn't this commonly considered a bit too late in the evening for a neighborly visit?"

"I was up. Heard voices. Thought I'd come check it out."

"Bad dreams again?" Dean's face was all the answer Cas needed. "Then shouldn't you be calming your nerves at the bridge?"

"What are you, my psychiatrist?" Dean rolled his eyes, sinking into a chair opposite Castiel.

"No, Dean," Cas replied - and was there a hint of a wry smile twisting his lips? "I would never presume to understand how your brain functions."

"Glad we're on the same page then."

"Yes." There was a long beat as Cas regarded him levelly, obviously pursuing some unknown internal line of inquiry. Finally, he blinked. "Why did you help me? Back at the bar. With Michael." Dean just looked at him, so he continued. "You weren't going to, and I don't blame you for that. But you changed your mind. Why?"

Dean shrugged, feeling as though Cas was shining some spotlight-microscope down on him. "I dunno, man," he said. "I guess I just don't much like seeing folk getting bullied." He met Castiel's eyes, seeing nothing but frank curiosity there. "I spent so much of my life getting pushed around by my - getting pushed around. I'm not the biggest fan of bullies."

"Hm."

"Anyway, that's not the most important question, is it?" Dean said. "This Angel Tablet of yours. What is it? Where is it?" He scanned Castiel's face, looking for some clue - anything at all. "You had a bag when you first came on with us, but that bag's gone curiously missing. You've stashed whatever was in it. Where?"

It was like shutters came down behind the other man's eyes, blocking out the faint traces of emotion he'd allowed to show. "I will tell you the same thing you overheard me tell your brother," he said. "Stop looking into this. You don't want to get involved."

Dean leaned forward, tacking on his best shit-eating grin. "I don't know if you've checked in with reality lately," he said, "but buddy, 'involved' is kinda underselling it for us."

Blue eyes locked on his own, and Dean needed to have a word with Charlie about the ventilation system because it felt like all the air in the room had evaporated. "You are a curious man, Captain Winchester," Cas said quietly.

"Thought you called me 'Dean' earlier," Dean murmured.

A corner of Castiel's mouth twitched up again. "Slip of the tongue."

But before Dean could come up with an equally witty rejoinder, there was a crash, and the floor and walls juddered unnervingly. "What in the hell -" Dean exclaimed.

Sam's voice was cracking over the comm before he could slip into more profanity. "Dean - bridge - now -"

Growing up on the Impala, Dean knew how many steps it took to get anywhere he needed to go. He could swear he cut the normal number in half, practically bounding out of Cas's room and up to the bridge. His head was spinning so wild with dangerous what-ifs that he didn't notice that Castiel was hot on his heels until the two of them pounded into the bridge together. Meg, recently settled into her chair, and Sam, hovering at her shoulder, both looked up at them.

"Uh -" Sam said, glancing from one to the other.

"Huh - oh -" Dean opened his mouth to order Cas back to his quarters, but the floor rocked again as something blasted past the nose of the Impala. "What the hell is that?"

"Crowley." Meg's teeth were gritted in concentration and frustration as she gripped the wheel, maneuvering the Impala through a turn that had Dean's stomach lurching.

"Why is Crowley -"

"Hello, boys."

The voice filtered through the comm, staticky but unmistakeable. At a nod from Dean, Meg flipped a switch on the console, bringing up the video feed of Crowley's smarmy, smiling face. His smile broadened as he saw the pilot. "Meg, my darling. It's been too long."

"Why? You looking for another ear piercing?" Meg shot back.

"Shut up, Meg," Dean said, almost off-hand. His eyes were locked on Crowley on the video screen. "What's this about, Crowley?"

"It's about mixed signals, my fine friend," the criminal responded. "It's about you turning down my offer to go after the mysterious Angel Tablet, then chasing it down yourself! Now, some less rational men might take offense at this - using information from me to further your own ends smacks a little bit of treachery, doesn't?"

"You're talking a lot of words, but nothing's making any kinda sense to me," Dean said, careful to keep his face blank.

"Yeah?" Crowley responded, his eyes hardening. "Then how is it that every police back channel in the quadrant is babbling away about Dean Winchester trading punches with Operatives over some unnamed cargo?" He leaned forward, closer to the camera. "I may look fresh as a morning daisy, but I wasn't born yesterday, Squirrel."

"Believe me," Meg drawled, "no one would make that mistake." Sam kicked her chair so hard that the petite woman nearly pitched out of her seat.

"Don't have anything tablet-like on-board, Crowley," Dean said. "But if you and your crew are prepared to turn around, we'd love to forget this whole exchange ever happened and resume our mutually beneficial business relationship."

"That's a big 'no-can-do'," Crowley responded, and his eyes _gleamed_ with glee. "You see, it's a matter of respect. It's what our two-way bond is built on. When respect is gone, that bond runs only one way. And do you know what you call a one way bond?" He glanced away from the camera, most likely signaling one of his crew. "That's what we call a leash, boys. And no one puts me on a leash." Turning back to the camera, he gave a little wave. "I'd say 'see you later', but... that would be a lie."

The feed cut out, and it was only Meg's truly astounding reflexes that had the Impala swooping out of the path of a series of blasts from Crowley's hulking ship. "Shit!" Dean exclaimed as he was thrown into the wall. "Sammy, get Charlie into the engine room, and tell Bela and Bobby to strap in. This is gonna be a nasty one."

Sam was gone without sparing the breath to affirm Dean's orders. Dean slid into the chair beside Meg, pulling the harness over his shoulders. "You too, Cas!" he shouted over his shoulder as Meg executed another evasive dive that had his dinner rising in his throat. "There's harnesses in the dining room -"

But Castiel was already dropping into the seat behind Dean, buckling himself in. "Taking the stairs now would be asking to have my neck broken, Captain," he said. "I'll remain here."

"Suit yourself," Dean shrugged, turning back to Meg.

"What's the plan, Cap?" Meg wanted to know. She had the tip of her tongue caught between her teeth as she concentrated.

"How far are we from Lawrence?"

"Two hours."

"Can you get us there?"

"If I could -" Cas began. "If this 'Crowley' follows you to Lawrence, you will no longer be 'laying low'. He seems like the type of man to have no compunctions with calling the Alliance down on you."

"Blue-Eyes is right," Meg said. "There's a debris field a little ways up - we could try to lose them in there -"

"They've already got us in their sights," Cas shot back. "I'm afraid a bit of clutter won't be enough to stop them from coming after us."

But something in Cas's words was ringing a million gongs inside of Dean's skull. "Calling the Alliance..." He blinked. "Meg. How far out is the nearest Alliance cruiser?"

"Cap?"

"_How far?"_

The pilot checked her radar. "Thirty minutes, with our capabilities," she said.

"But how long would it take for _them_ to come to _us_?"

Meg just stared at him. "You _want_ to bring the feds down on our heads?"

"No," Dean said. "I want to bring them down on Crowley."

A huff of breath across the back of his neck - was Castiel laughing? Meg smiled at him, a slow, lazy thing. "With their shiny toys?" she said. "Ten minutes. Easy."

"Think you can get us to that debris field in that time?"

"Watch me."

Grinning, Dean flicked on the comm to the engine room. "Charlie? You hearing me?"

"Loud and clear, Captain. What's our play?"

"I want you to have us ready to go dark, all of a moment."

"Lose everything?"

"Except life support, yeah. Can you do that for me?"

He heard Charlie's snort. "Who do you think you're talking to?"

"You have quite a cocky crew, Captain," Cas muttered in Deans' ear. Dean flashed him a quick smile.

"Some might say I've rubbed off on 'em. Start the distress signal, Meg."

Cas watched as Meg flipped another switch on the console and pressed a flashing blue button. "Will an Alliance cruiser show up for just any distress signal?"

"No," Meg said. "But this is an embassy ship." She grinned back at him. "Or at least, that's what the signal says."

The next few minutes were some of the most unpleasant of Dean's life (or at least, the most unpleasant of his life in the last year). He spent it white-knuckling the arms of his chair, fighting down the bile that threatened to spew up his throat and out of his mouth. This was his secret, the thing he tried his hardest to hide from his crew - this sort of reckless, devil-may-care flying... he _hated_ it. That hatred had been one of the reasons he had eventually consented to hand the wheel over to Meg, who took on the challenge with the same sort of berserker joy she infused in everything she did.

After one particularly stomach-churning roll, Dean chanced a glance behind him at Castiel. The man was staring out the window with a serene expression - not smiling like Meg, but not miserable like Dean either. He might as well have been out for a sunny stroll, for all the emotion he showed. _Operatives_, Dean thought, suppressing a shudder. _Maybe they are robots, like some of the stories say._

But then Cas glanced his way, their eyes locked - and Dean saw a spark of some electrifying excitement behind the man's blue gaze. Whatever it was, it was intense, wild, and definitely human. _ What _are_ you?_ he found himself wondering. _Who are you?_

No time for introspection, though - a well-aimed blast from Crowley's ship caught the Impala across one of her engines (the shields of which Charlie had been nagging Dean about for months now). "_Go Shi_!" Meg exclaimed.

"That ain't great, huh?" Dean managed to get out.

"Cap!" Charlie's voice blared over the comm. "That's the portside engine. We'll be limping in a minute. How far out is -"

"Debris field up ahead," Meg was saying simultaneously. "I think we can just about make it if -"

"Dean, the radar screen -" Cas said. "The Alliance cruiser is -"

"Cut power," Dean barked into the comm.

"We're not at the field yet -"

"Cut. Power. Now."

"You got it, boss," Charlie said though the comm.

The lights went out all at once, and the hum of the one good engine died with it. Meg, Dean, and Cas were left sitting in the dark bridge with nothing to see by but the stars.

"Okay," Dean said, heaving a breath. He realized he was whispering, but didn't raise the volume. It didn't seem appropriate. "Now. Meg. I don't envy what I'm about to ask you to do, but - can you get us into that field?"

She considered the question for a long moment. "Trajectory should be alright," she said, "but Crowley's gonna be on our ass in just a few -"

"Is he?" Dean asked innocently. Meg glanced up, obviously noticing that the ever-present blasts from the other ship had died down.

Staring down at the scanner, she cocked an eyebrow. "He ran for it," she said. "Saw the Alliance coming and ran for it. Cowardly piece of shit."

"Now we just have to hope the Alliance doesn't lay eyes on us," Dean muttered. "So. Debris field. Now?"

"Sir, yes sir," Meg said, and focused all her attention on maneuvering the engine-less ship into the belt of floating metal-and-rock. Dean sat back in his seat with a sigh of temporary relief.

"That was very impressive," Castiel said quietly.

"I'm a pretty impressive guy," Dean replied.

"What was that I was saying about the cocky crew?" Cas wondered aloud, and Dean uttered a quick laugh. _The guy had actually made a joke._

The Alliance cruiser loomed out of the darkness of space, all intimidating proportions and bad intentions. Dean realized he was holding his breath, staring at the ship like a man on death row staring down a gun barrel. "Someone's gotta teach the Alliance about subtlety one day," he muttered.

"That'll be a day indeed." That was Sam, sliding into the seat next to Cas and buckling himself in. "Are we done with the roller-coaster ride?"

"Crowley's dicked off," Dean said. "Which is just putting me in mind of an old saying about a frying pan and fire..."

"They're scanning us," Meg said. "Scanning _for_ us. Anyone up for a quick prayer?"

The only response was grim silence from the rest of the bridge. Four pairs of eyes watched the monolithic Alliance ship approach the belt of debris. He knew it was all in his head, but Dean could swear he could feel the gaze of the Alliance troops peeling back the walls of the Impala and scraping along his skin.

They sat there for what seemed like an Ice Age, each person tensed into position, not moving a muscle. Then -

"They're moving on," Meg said. Dean sagged back into his chair.

"If you'd gotten us strung up because of that stupid stunt, I'd'a never let you forget it," Sam said. "Seriously, Dean?"

"Seemed the thing to do at the time," Dean said weakly.

"We won't be able to use that distress signal again," Meg observed. "Not for a few months, at least."

"Let's hope we don't have to," he responded, before opening the comm channel back to Charlie again. "Charlie - give it thirty, then kick the systems back on-line."

"Engine ain't in great shape, Cap," the mechanic said. Dean winced.

"You're practically a wizard with that stuff, don't pretend like you're not," he said. "Work your magic. We're gonna have to limp our way to Lawrence one way or another."

**xXx**

Dean didn't like the term "crash-landing", but that was essentially how the Impala touched down on the barren little quasi-terraformed rock known as Lawrence. It was a small planet - insignificant to damn near anyone in the 'verse, including the few thousand people who lived on it. But - and Dean was slightly horrified to realize this about himself - it still counted as home to him.

"Let's not do that again," he said as the dust settled around the Impala. Sam nodded, looking queasy, while Meg slowly released her grip on the wheel. Dean pretended not to notice the way the pilot's knuckles had been white with tension. Behind him, Castiel was unbuckling his harness, and Dean was impressed by the fact that the Operative's hands weren't shaking even a little.

"What are the chances that no one in town saw us come down?" Dean asked Sam, who shook his head.

"I'd say somewhere between 'wishful thinking' and 'pipe dream'," Sam replied. "Come on, let's see what the damage is."

The cargo hold was a mess, and Dean made a mental note to start doing a better job of strapping things down. At least two boxes of protein-stuff had been knocked open during the rocky ride to the planet's surface, covering the floor with enough food to feed the crew for at least a week and a half. Bobby was already at work sweeping the mess up - he looked up at Dean and Sam as they made their way down the stairs, and his expression was less than pleased.

"Mind telling me whose damn fool idea it was getting the Alliance mixed up in our business?" he wanted to know. Sam, the traitor, pointed a finger at Dean.

"We're still alive, ain't we?" Dean protested.

"If that's your measure of success, you idjit, I don't know how you've survived this long," Bobby grumbled.

There was an _oof_ over Dean's head. He looked up to see Meg plopping herself down on the edge of the catwalk and swinging her legs over the edge, looking a bit shell-shocked. A pair of slender arms wrapped around Dean's middle from behind and squeezed. Dean reached down to pat Charlie's hands reassuringly. "That was some good work, Charlie."

"Good work yourself," the mechanic replied. "I thought we were toast for a second there." She released Dean and spun him around, looking him in the eye. "Now will you listen to me when I tell you we need to completely retool our engine shields?"

"No promises, but feel free to rub this in my face in the future."

A tousled, sleepy head stuck out of the crew quarters. Bela brushed her hair out of her eyes, blinking at the rest of the crew. "Have we arrived?" she wanted to know.

Sam stared at her. "You slept through the whole damn thing?"

"What whole damn thing?"

"Oh my God," Charlie muttered, before cracking up into hysterical giggles. The rest of the crew was not far behind.

Peering through laughter-bleary eyes, Dean found Castiel watching the whole lot of them with a bemused expression on his typically stony face. He watched the group like a scientist surveying a curious new species - slightly uncertain and afraid, but mostly intrigued. Dean gave him a curt nod, which the Operative returned.

The high-strung merriment was interrupted by a pounding at the door - not the insistent, soft sound of a fist rapping, but the hard, sharp rap of the butt of a gun meeting metal. Dean straightened, reaching for the colt strapped to his side.

"It's too early in the morning for this shit," he complained softly before manning the hell up and hitting the button to release the loading bay door.

Three figures were revealed as the door slid down - two women and one man. One of the women was middle-aged, with long hair and an aggressive stance - she held her sawed-off like she knew how to use it. The other woman was much younger, slender, but no less assertive in her stance. The man was built like a fucking tree, tall and brawny. Backlit as they were by the rising sun, Dean had a hard time seeing their faces.

"Hey there," Dean said, trying to keep his voice easy. "'Mornin'."

The trio said nothing, but they made no move to lower their weapons, either.

"You can see we've run into a bit of engine difficulty," Dean continued, stepping carefully forward. "Had to make a stop to get her back in order."

The older woman stepped forward a bit. "This your boat?"

"Yes ma'am, it is." He couldn't make out her eyes, but Dean would put good money on the woman squinting at him through the dimness of the cargo hold. Another step brought her under one of the overhead lights, and Dean felt his face suddenly break out in a massive smile.

"Ellen?" That was Sammy, stepping forward himself.

The woman broke out in a loud guffaw, lowering her sawed-off. "Son of a gun," she muttered. "The Winchester boys, all back in one piece."

"Bobby, that you?" That was the man, and Bobby let out a loud laugh of his own.

"Rufus, you still alive? Thought you'd have kicked it way back." Bobby strode forward to pound the man on the back.

"Could say the same to you, you old bastard," Rufus replied.

"Not that I ain't glad to see you boys," Ellen said, "but trouble does have a habit of tailing your family. You bringing any with you to Lawrence?"

The "no, 'course not" died on his lips as Dean stared into Ellen's savvy gaze. "There's a chance," he said.

"Hm," the woman said, studying Dean. She must have liked what she saw there because she smiled once more. "When isn't there?" Ellen pulled Dean into a fierce hug, embracing him like it was the last time she'd see him.

"Welcome back to Lawrence, boys," she said. "Welcome home."


	4. Chapter 4

The smell of peanuts, stale beer, cheap whiskey, and old carpeting hit Dean right in the catharsis, and he felt a smile spreading across his face before he realized it.

_The Roadhouse_. Once upon a time, he'd called this place home-base. It had been the haven where Dean, Sam, and their dad would regroup after a long few weeks or months trekking to the ass-end corners of the 'verse. Dean had his first drink here at age fourteen - it had been gin, straight from a bottle he'd stolen from behind the bar, and he had spent the next two hours retching into a toilet bowl.

John had just nodded blankly. Ellen had sat up with him, giving him glass after glass of water, then kicked his ass when he woke up the next morning.

And then one night, on this same shitty carpet, Sam had stood up and announced to his family that he was ditching them for the Core. That life in the Impala wasn't no kind of life at all, as far as he was concerned. That he wanted to do something better - something more important - than chasing odd jobs and dodging hangovers and Alliance enforcers.

After that, Dean had decided that he was done with The Roadhouse and Lawrence alike. He didn't want to be there without Sammy - it wasn't home. He foggily remembered making some sort of loud proclamation to that effect after about a million whiskeys too many.

And now he was back, hooking his ankles around the same bar stool he used to ride back when he was a kid. On the surface, it seemed as though nothing much had changed - even the dartboard looked like it hadn't been resurfaced any time in the last ten years. Dean could see the tiny "D" he'd etched in the corner one night after beating Bobby fifteen games in a row.

Meg and Bela were facing off against one another in a pool-death-match, moderated and cheered on by a scrawny mulleted guy wearing a sleeveless flannel shirt. Dean knew without closer inspection that the scummy green carpeted table was the same one he'd passed out on on more than one occasion. Bobby and Rufus had taken over Dean's favorite corner booth, sharing stories and a bottle of the best stuff in the place.

Cas was nowhere to be seen. Dean didn't let himself think about this too much.

"This is super weird, huh?" he muttered to Sam, who was watching their surroundings with the same kind of wide-eyed disbelief Dean felt on his own face. "Like a time machine or something."

"I feel like Dad's about to walk in any second," Sam responded, eyeing the door. "This is..."

"Yeah."

"Yeah," Sam agreed.

Two full glasses slammed onto the bar behind them, breaking the tension that stretched between the two brothers. _Thank God,_ Dean thought, turning back to level a devastating grin at their bartender.

That was something that _had_ changed in the last decade. Dean remembered Joanna Beth Harvelle as a scrawny little girl with dirt and defiance on her face, hair pulled back in a messy pigtail, and scabbed knees. Now... the defiance was still there, but the scrawny little girl had turned into... well... a woman. "How's it going, there, Joanna?"

"It's Jo," the woman responded shortly, propping her fists on her hips in a manner that was frighteningly reminiscent of her mother. "And you know exactly how it's going, Dean Winchester." She leaned both hands on the bar, glaring at him. "Where the hell have you been for the last ten years?"

Dean heard Sam snort into his drink. He stared into Jo's angry brown eyes, feeling completely blindsided. "Uh - what?"

"_Ten. Years."_

Dean carefully moved his glass out of Jo's reach. He didn't put it past her to pick it up and aim it at his head, and the bruise where the beer bottle had clobbered him was already throbbing like a motherfucker. "Around," he said. "C'mon, Jo, I've been busy."

"You promised me," she said, "that you'd take me with you. You promised you'd come back and I could go with you." Dean couldn't help but notice that her hands were clenching into very dangerous-looking fists. "You _promised me._"

"You were ten!" Dean exclaimed.

"So?"

"So you were ten! What's a kid gonna do on the Impala?"

"You tell me," Jo hissed. "You were working on that boat when you were ten."

"Alright," Sam cut in before Dean could say something to further tarnish the memory of the Roadhouse. "Jo, Dean's sorry. Dean, Jo's sorry. We're all sorry. Okay? And obviously there's some stuff to hash out here, but maybe tonight's not the night?"

There was another tense moment. Jo held Dean's gaze with an intensity that did not surprise Dean in the slightest. He was the one to look away with a slight nod.

"Okay," Jo muttered quietly. Behind him, Dean heard the door to the Roadhouse open. He didn't pay it any mind until he saw the way that Jo's eyes widened. She glanced quickly from the doorway, to Dean and Sam, then back to the doorway again.

"Uh - is that -" she began, and Dean entertained a brief moment of pants-shitting alarm as the prospect of an undeclared visit from Crowley or that douchebag Michael slammed through his brain. But Jo didn't look confused. She looked -

"Hi, guys!"

"Hey, Charlie," Sam greeted the mechanic, trading nods with her as she slid onto the bar stool next to him. "How's she looking?"

"Banged up," Charlie said, shaking her head. "We didn't treat her so good on our way planet-side, and I basically had to cannibalize the aft cooling system in order to Frankenstein our engine shields back together enough to not die on landing. But Bobby's buddy Rufus should have most of the parts we need, and those we don't have, we should be able to make." She grinned at the Winchesters excitedly. "I love crafts," she said. It took her a moment to realize that she had an audience. "Sorry," she apologized to Jo. "I get carried away sometimes. Hi, I'm Charlie."

Jo stared at the woman's outstretched hand for a moment before reaching out her own to shake it. "Jo," she said.

"Oh yeah, I remember you!" Charlie said. "You had a gun trained on us when we landed."

"Uh -"

"It looked like a pretty sweet piece," Charlie said, leaning forward, conspiratorial. Dean groaned. He knew that move. He'd _taught_ Charlie that move.

"Vintage .38," Jo said, all beaming pride. "It was my Dad's."

Charlie whistled low. "Pretty old."

"Yeah, well," Jo shrugged. "I keep her in good working order." She leaned forward herself, resting her elbows on the bar. "I know how to appreciate good machinery when I see it."

Charlie's _gulp_ was audible. When Dean looked over at her, he saw she was flushed as red as her hair. _Point Jo, _he thought. It took special skill to render Charlie speechless.

"I'm just gonna -" Dean said, sliding off his stool.

"Me too -" Sam echoed, standing as well. But neither woman seemed interested in their departure, Charlie flapping a dismissive hand at the two men. Both stifling hysterical laughter, Sam and Dean headed over to the Rufus and Bobby Story Hour.

**xXx**

"Thought I'd find you up here."

Ellen clambered out the rooftop window with far more grace than a woman in her 40s should be able to manage. Making her way over the rooftop tiles, she plopped down next to Dean, offering him a bottle of something amber and alcoholic.

"You never let me drink this much before," Dean observed, taking the bottle from her.

"You were a kid," Ellen said.

"I was twenty-two!"

"Kid."

Dean huffed a laugh before taking a deep swig and staring back up at the stars. "I'm really that predictable?"

"You have your moments. Or maybe I just know you better'n you think I do."

"Sammy and I used to think you were psychic - you always knew when we were goofing off."

Ellen laughed at that, taking the bottle back from him. "Ain't psychic," she said. "Far as I know, there's no such thing. You boys are just damn idiots - way too easy to read."

"You're starting to sound like Bobby."

"Good. That man's got more brains in his skull than you'n Sam have between you."

"You're not wrong," Dean agreed, taking another drink. When he lowered the bottle, he found Ellen Looking at him in that damn penetrating way of hers. "What?"

"Not that I ain't glad as all hell to see you," she said, not looking away, "but I seem to remember you making a vow at top-volume that you were putting Lawrence in your rear-view for good. I find myself wondering what in the 'verse you're doing back on this rock?"

"Wasn't my decision," Dean said, looking back at the sky.

"I'm betting on that. But that wasn't an answer."

"Ellen -"

"Don't 'Ellen' me," the woman snapped. "You think I don't know a blasted-apart engine shield when I see one? 'A little trouble' my ass. You show up here after God knows how many years with nothing but a crash-landing and a shit-eating smile to show for it? Hell. You know the Alliance has cruisers looking for a ship like the Impala across three quadrants? Chatter's been going on for over a day. And not the run-of-the-mill Alliance chatter, either - these are the Big Bads looking for you, boy, so excuse me for giving a damn and wanting to know how I can help you out!"

Dean blinked up at her, stunned by this outpouring of aggressive maternal protection. Then something behind her words clicked. "How d'you know all that?" he asked. "We established that you're not psychic - but even you can't read people that well."

Ellen sighed, grabbing the bottle back from him and capping it. "Ash," she said.

Dean cocked an eyebrow. "That supposed to mean something to me?"

"You seen that guy with the dumb hair playing pool with your girls downstairs?" Ellen asked. Dean nodded. "Well, underneath that dumb hair is one of the most genius brains in the galaxy. You want to know something? Ash can figure it out for you."

"He's a genius," Dean repeated flatly. "And he hangs out here?"

"Hey," Ellen shrugged, standing again. "Some people appreciate a good place when they find it."

**xXx**

As far as mornings went, the following one wasn't one of Dean's favorites. He blinked awake on the bridge, nestled deep in the leather of Meg's chair, both legs propped up on the console. The morning sunlight was streaming through the windows like shiny daggers, piercing his corneas and adding to the headache pounding behind his eyes. Dean groaned, raising his hands to rub his face, and noted with a start that someone had seen fit to cover him with a blanket.

"Hello, Dean."

It wasn't even worth it to be startled anymore, and yelling at Castiel for surprising him was fighting a losing battle at this point. Dean just hauled himself into a sitting position, biting back a moan as the various cramped muscles in his back, neck, and legs protested independently and together. "Hey, Cas," he said. "We missed you last night."

The Operative was sitting in the other chair, posture immaculate as always, staring out the window at the landscape as though it was the most interesting thing he'd ever seen. "I did not think that my presence would be invited," he said.

"Hey, you've saved my ass at least once," Dean said. "The least I can do is buy you a beer." He glanced down at the blanket over him and made a deductive leap. "Thanks for the blanket, by the way."

"You looked cold."

"I imagine I was."

"I took it from Bela's room."

Dean grinned. "Yeah? Did you ask her first?"

"No." Castiel met his eyes then, and Dean saw a hint of humor twinkling in the bright blue depths. "But she got such excellent rest the previous night, I thought she would not miss it."

Dean laughed at that. "Can't fault your logic there," he said, reaching over to clap the other man on the shoulder before he even registered what he was doing. "Come on, let's get some breakfast and you can tell me what you were doing all night. Since you weren't rabble-rousing like the rest of us."

Castiel trailed Dean into the mess, always half a pace behind. It was a strange habit, but one Dean didn't mind - it felt secure to know that someone was literally watching his back. "I took the opportunity to inquire around about other vehicles traveling off-world," Cas said as Dean turned the corner into the mess.

Something lurched in the pit of Dean's stomach. "That so?"

"Yes. I have prevailed upon your merciful nature for far too long, Captain, and I am afraid that my presence has done nothing but land you in trouble. I am sorry for this."

"And could you dig up any damn fools who want to take you off-world?"

"Not at the moment," Cas replied, watching as Dean began slamming open cabinets, searching for the ever-elusive hangover-cure-all tea. "It seems as though the people of Lawrence do not make much of a habit of traveling off-planet. The one vessel capable of such a journey is currently undergoing some extensive maintenance, and the pilot informed me that it would be at least one week until she is able to fly."

"Well good," Dean said, finally finding the tea tucked away behind a cheese grater and several old muffin tins. "That's the point of laying low, anyhow. You're not supposed to just hare off again." He fixed Cas with a look he hoped rivaled Ellen's. "Where you planning on heading off to anyway?" There was that familiar shuttering of Castiel's expression. "Cas..." Dean warned.

The man blinked at him - then something in his face eased. Dean could actually see him biting at the inside of his lip before opening his mouth to respond - the most downright human thing he'd ever witnessed in Castiel.

But before he could actually speak, a slight figure shuffled into the mess. "Mornin'," said Jo, reaching blearily for the tea in Dean's outstretched hand.

He gaped at her. "What the hell are you doing here? How did you get on this boat?"

She smirked at him, pouring steaming water into a cup and adding the tea. "Told you I would."

Charlie trudged into the mess, looking every bit as sleepy and self-satisfied as Jo. She took the tea that Jo handed her and flopped into her chair at the table. "I'll be in your bunk," Jo told the mechanic, trailing a hand across the woman's shoulders as she moved past her out onto the catwalk.

It took Charlie a solid moment before realizing that Dean was glaring at her. "What?" she demanded.

"Tell me you didn't let yourself get seduced by Joanna Beth Harvelle."

"Hey, I resent your implication," Charlie said. "There was mutual seducing going on."

"That's a yes," Cas observed.

Charlie took a long sip of her tea. "Well, it's not a no."

**xXx**

It wasn't hard to find Ash. In fact, he was right where Dean had left him, sprawled out on the pool table at the Roadhouse and snoring loud enough to rattle the windows. Dean stood watching him for a long moment before he realized that he was acting like a fucking creep, so he grabbed a pool cue and started poking the sleeping man with it.

"Hey," he said. "Hey, mullet-man. Wake up."

Ash awoke with a snort and a start, leaping to his feet and completely failing to stick the landing. His fists flailed into a strange approximation of a fighting stance. "What the hell, man?!" he demanded. "Don't you know if you wake a sleeping man, your testicles rot off?"

Dean winced at the image. "Hell, you're the genius," he said. "But I'm willing to bet you're also full of shit."

Ash laughed at that, low and rolling. "All right, all right," he said, lowering his arms. "You're okay. Hey -" he peered closer at Dean's face. "You're that Captain guy, right? Riding with those two smoking hot ladies from last night? Boy, you are one lucky sonuvabitch. I'd envy you if I didn't think those two'd eat me alive if I gave 'em the chance."

"They'd take the chance, whether you gave it or not," Dean replied.

Another laugh from Ash. "You're okay," he repeated. "So how can I help the brave interstellar Captain so early in the morning?"

Dean glanced at the clock. It was already noon. "I have an... intellectual problem," he said. He swore he could see Ash's ears prick up under his mullet. "Some information I need dug up. And Ellen tells me you have the biggest brain in the galaxy."

"Ellen's good PR," Ash replied, but his eyes were shining with curiosity. "What kind of information?"

Dean leaned his hands on the pool table and spoke in a hushed voice. "I need to know everything you can find about something called an Angel Tablet."

**xXx**

"_You get away from my son."_

_Mom's voice was low and dangerous, not like it was when she talked other times. Dean clutched his hands into his blanket, watching his mother through slitted eyes. He knew - somehow he _knew_ - that it was important that he pretend to be asleep._

_The Shadow Man did not move away from Sammy's crib. "He's one of us," he said. "One way or another, we will take him."_

"_Like hell." Mom spat the words out like they tasted bad. "He's a child. He's not a part of this."_

"_He's _your_ child. He is the biggest part of this." And with those ominous words, the Shadow Man reached out towards Sammy's crib._

_Dean hadn't known his mother could move that fast. She was almost a blur, placing herself between the Shadow Man and her son, all preternatural speed and grace. She leveled a blow at the stranger that would have had him out cold... if he'd still been there. But the man was even faster than Mom, suddenly spinning to appear at her side, gun in hand..._

_The laser shot went wild, hitting the ceiling and igniting the thatch. _

_The second shot found its mark._

_Mama dropped._

"_No! Mama!"_

"Dean!"

"_Mama, no!"_

"Dean, come on, wake up, man -"

Dean sat upright so fast he could feel the burn in his stomach muscles. He swung wildly with his fist, catching Ash in the shoulder hard. The man stumbled back, rubbing his shoulder with his other hand.

"Ow! Jesus, man!"

It took Dean a long moment to realize where he was - sitting on the edge of the pool table in the Roadhouse. The sun was still shining outside, though the softened rays told him that it was on its way down past the horizon, day turning to night. Dean groaned, resting his head in his palms.

"That was some nightmare you were having," Ash told him, watching him warily from a safe distance.

"Yeah."

"You wanna talk about or -"

"Definitely not."

"Okay. Solid. Fine." Easygoing to a fault, Ash ambled back to the computer set up he'd erected in one of the booths. "You were just shouting pretty loud, that's all."

"Yeah."

"Anyway, I'm still a few hours away from anything sure on that Angel Tablet thingie. Whatever this is, man, it's something no one wants us to know about." He practically rubbed his hands in glee. "It's gotta be _awesome_. But unless you want to try for another siesta on fields of felted green, you should probably take a hike. Ellen'll be in to open up soon, and she'll put you to work if she sees you."

"Yeah. Okay." Dean's head was still ringing from the screams of his nightmares. He pushed himself to his feet, hoping the change in altitude would clear the horrifying cotton out of his ears. "Uh... you'll call if you find anything?"

"You got it, compadre."

"Right."

Dean shrugged on his coat and shuffled out the door. Once outside, he stood in the fresh air for a moment, feeling the slight breeze blow cool across his cheeks. That damn dream. It was worse now, here, on Lawrence, where everything had actually happened. He felt like he could still smell the smoke, billowing around him in acrid clouds. The terror in the nursery swelled around him until he was choking on it, even here in the sunshine.

His hand shook as he reached up to tap his comm. "Sam?" he called. No response from the other end of the line. "Sammy?" Still nothing.

With an exasperated sigh, he tapped again. "Hey, Bobby?"

This time he only had to wait a moment for a reply. "What?"

"You seen Sammy? He's not answering his comm."

"Last I saw, he was headed out of the Impala this morning with a constipated look on his face. Didn't say where he was headed, though."

Dean nodded grimly, though there was no one around to see it. "I think I can guess. Thanks, Bobby."

"You doin' okay, you idjit?" Bobby asked after a long pause.

"I'm fine," Dean lied, the classic Winchester fib slipping through his teeth like water. He knew Bobby didn't believe him - Winchesters had been saying that for so long that it was practically code for "I am so fucking close to the edge right now", but it was putting up a brave front that counted anyway. "See you tonight."

It wasn't a short walk to the old Winchester place outside of town, but Dean knew the way by heart. He'd studiously avoided paying the house a visit for so long that the location burned bright in his mind, lit up with mental "DO NOT APPROACH" signs. He did his best to turn his brain off on the walk, focusing on anywhere but his destination, focusing on the Impala, on Charlie hooking up with Jo (which, no, ugh), on... Castiel...

Dean was no dummy, though he liked to pretend to be. Being underestimated by people who saw him as an emotionally stunted pretty boy gave him a certain edge in business dealings. He knew that what he thought of when he thought of Cas was pretty gorram far from what a typical person felt for a passenger on their boat - even a passenger that had brought them as much of a headache as Cas had.

He _liked_ Cas. He liked the way he moved in a fight, liked the way his eyes sparked with secret humor when he told one of those jokes that was nearly not a joke. He liked how deep his voice was, and he liked that Cas was concerned for Dean and his crew and the danger he'd put them in by joining up with them.

He _didn_'_t_ like the secrecy. There were chasms of information that the man was covering up, stuff that Dean felt he really needed to know. Because he didn't want Castiel to jet off with some other random boat - he wanted to help him, if he could. But before he could volunteer himself (and whichever members of his crew were stupid enough to come along), he needed to know what he was getting them into. And he couldn't do that if Cas kept doing his best impression of a stubborn oyster, sealing his lips as tight as they would seal.

It was to thoughts of those lips that Dean arrived outside what had once been the Winchester homestead. When it had been whole, it had been a small house - well-loved, well-cared-for, but small, like everything else on Lawrence. Now it was nothing more than a mouldering shell, falling to pieces right in front of Dean's eyes.

Nobody had wanted to rebuild on that spot, not after what had happened to Mary Winchester. So instead the plot of land had been left to seed. Land wasn't at much of a premium here on Lawrence anyways. Nobody was willing to invite the sort of bad luck that came with building on Dead Man's Ground.

"Hiya, Sammy."

Sam was standing in front of the steps leading up to the small porch, both hands shoved as deep into his pockets as they would go. His head was bowed, almost as though he was praying, and he barely looked up at Dean as he approached.

"Hey," he said quietly.

"What'cha doin'?"

"Just thinking," Sam replied. "Paying my respects. To Mom." Now he glanced over at Dean, who pretended not to notice the tear-bright sheen in his brother's eyes. "It's been a while since we've been back here, huh?"

"Years."

"Years," Sam repeated. He drew in a shaky breath. "Too long." The brothers stood in silence for a moment, watching the house.

"I wish I could remember that night." The words burst from Sam in angry punches. "I wish I remembered what happened. Why it happened."

Dean bit his lip. "No you don't."

"Why not? You do."

"Only pieces of it."

"You remember Mom," Sam muttered rebelliously.

There was nothing Dean could say to that, so he settled for bumping his shoulder against Sam's and standing next to him in silence for the next ten minutes, watching the house they could have grown up in and the life they could have had.

"I need a drink," Sam finally mumbled, scrubbing a hand across his face.

"You and me both, Sammy," Dean agreed. "Come on. First round's on you for dragging me all the way out here."

"Jerk." But Sam was smiling.

"Bitch," Dean shot back, smiling as well. But he glanced over his shoulder to the house one last time as they walked away. If he squinted, he could make out the memory of smoke, of flame... and of the Shadow Man standing in the nursery window.

The walk back to the Roadhouse went much slower without mental images of bright blue eyes and soft-looking lips to keep him company. Dean had to settle for tormenting Sam mercilessly for the eyes he had been making at a pretty blonde medic at the Roadhouse the night before. "Who knows," he said, "if you're lucky, she'll be there tonight. Maybe she'll even braid your hair!"

"Shut up," Sam grumbled. "Anyway, you don't see me teasing you for the eyes you've been making at Castiel."

"Dunno what you're talking about," Dean deadpanned.

"'Oh, Castiel, you're so strong and interesting, and you fight so gorram good!'" Sam sing-songed in a high-pitched voice.

"That supposed to be me?"

"'Let's fly around the 'verse forever together and have medically impossible babies!'"

"You're an asshole."

"I'm your _brother_."

"Asshole brother."

The Roadhouse was filling up for the evening by the time they stumbled through the door, Dean trying his best to put his gargantuan brother in a headlock and, if possible, flick his ear. The sharp "NO ROUGHHOUSING, BOYS" that Ellen barked at them had them springing apart like they'd been electrocuted, and Dean took the opportunity to note that Ash and his computer equipment had evidently disappeared for parts unknown when the bar had opened.

Though the place wasn't crammed, it sure was loud - mostly because of the crowd at one end of the bar. Sam and Dean ambled closer to get a good look at the night's entertainment, and Dean nearly reeled in shock when he saw that the particular entertainment in question was none other than Castiel.

Someone - Dean was inclined to blame Jo - had lined up an insurmountable series of shots in front of the Operative, and the bar patrons were going absolutely insane as he knocked them back one by one. "Wuh De Ma," Dean muttered, watching the scene unfold.

"You're the one who's gonna have to hold his hair," Sam told him.

Down went the last shot, Cas placing the glass upside-down on the bar with a definitive click. He looked up at Jo, surprisingly clear-eyed, and cocked his head. "I think I'm beginning to feel something," he said.

The cheers that erupted nearly deafened Dean. Castiel handled the pats on the back and the punches to the shoulder with friendly ease, but the moment his eyes locked on Dean, he began making his way over.

"You having fun?" Dean asked.

"You said you owed me a beer. I thought I might find you here."

Next to Dean, Sam erupted into a fit of coughing, and Dean had to physically restrain himself from kicking his brother in the ankle. "Sorry," Sam managed. "I'm just gonna... get some water." He slipped into the crowd.

"Glad to see you haven't flown away yet," Dean said. Castiel's eyebrows quirked together.

"I told you this morning," he said. "The vessel will not be ready for at least a week."

The twisting sensation returned in the base of Dean's gut. "Right," he said. "How 'bout that beer?"

Five minutes later, the enthusiastic crowd had moved on, entertainment-wise, to Meg, who was performing some complicated and deadly juggling routine with her switchblade. Dean sent out a quick prayer that his pilot wouldn't wind up missing most of her fingers by the time they left that evening, and slid into the booth that Bobby and Rufus had occupied the night before, beer in hand. Castiel slid in after him, and they watched the Roadhouse floor for a spell.

"You're quiet," Cas said, taking a sip of his beer.

"Yeah," Dean agreed. "'S just weird being home, is all. You know."

"I don't."

Dean blinked at the other man, who was blithely sipping at his beer. "What?"

Cas put his beer down and fixed him with that piercing stare of his. "You have not returned to Lawrence in ten years, but it is still home to you. This is something that I have a hard time understanding."

"I don't - it just - it just _is_," Dean sputtered. This sort of in-depth conversation was not something he'd been prepared for.

"Not particularly enlightening, as explanations go."

"You -" he caught the twinkle of amusement deep in the Operative's eyes. "You're fucking with me. You're being a dick on purpose."

"More or less," Cas responded. "But I still have a difficult time grasping the situation."

"I don't know, man," Dean said, shrugging. "It just is, like I said. What's home for you?"

There was music starting in the background - a lively beat that had several bar patrons stomping their feet and clapping along. Glancing at the source of the music, Dean found Bobby and Bela joining forces with Rufus next to the bar, Bela's long fingers dancing over the strings of someone's fiddle while Bobby strummed a mandolin. Dean gave it two minutes, maximum, before a dance broke out.

Cas didn't seem to hear the music, though - he was lost somewhere in his own memory... someplace unpleasant, if his expression was anything to go by. "Operatives do not have homes," he said finally. "We are taken from our families so young - selected for our innate abilities in strength, intelligence, and logic."

"That sounds gorram bleak."

"Invulnerability to pain and emotion is cut into us," Cas continued, not seeming to hear Dean. "The concept of home becomes alien. So does the concept of family. It is considered something of a weakness. But," he said, finally looking back up at Dean, "I can see how it would be an appealing idea."

_It would be fucking amazing to kiss you right now._

Could Operatives read minds? Dean didn't think so, but he hoped that Cas could read his. _I want to lean forward right now and swallow every painful word coming out of those plush lips_, he thought as loud as he could_. I want to press you against the wall and slide my hand up the front of that stupid damn shirt and I want to hear you whisper my name. And I want to kiss your neck and I want to feel you tugging at my clothing and -_

_I want you not to kill me for thinking these things._

He was leaning against the table, he realized, bowing his body towards Castiel's. Even in the dim light of the bar, he could see Cas's eyes blazing with something - passion, interest, anger?

"Cas," he whispered, one hand inching across the tabletop towards Castiel.

"Yes?" Cas whispered back, voice gone even more gravelly (which Dean did not think was possible).

"Dance with me!"

For the first time in his life, Dean entertained less-than-happy thoughts about Charlie Bradbury. But there she was, standing in front of the booth with her cheeks flushed from the neon-bright cocktails she fancied (and which Jo was most likely only too happy to ply her with). She grabbed Dean's arm in both of her hands and began hauling him towards the edge of the booth. "Dance. With. Me." she said, grunting with effort.

"Alright, alright," Dean acquiesced. "Cas -"

"If Blue-Eyes needs a partner, I'll be only too happy to step in," Meg said, sauntering up behind Charlie. Her switchblade was safely stowed somewhere, but knowing it was around did not make Dean any less nervous. "I'm sure he's really generous on the dance floor."

Dean only had a moment to exchange panicked glances with Cas before both of them were dragged out onto the floorboards, whirling and stomping in time with the music. Despite his initial reluctance to be pulled into the revelry, Dean felt himself relaxing as the notes washed over him, frantic and soothing at the same time. As he spun, he caught glimpses of the other dancers - though most were unknown to him, there were several familiar faces that hit him like rocket-blasts from the past. Pamela, the local herbalist with an affinity for old music, cheap booze, and grungy men. The pretty blond medic Sam had been chatting with last night - what was her name? Jen? Jess? Victor, the deputy sheriff, whose normally stern face was cracked with a small smile as a short woman with long brown hair whirled him around.

"Switch partners!" Rufus barked over the strains of the fiddle, and Dean suddenly found his hand grasped by fingers that were much longer and much stronger than Charlie's.

He blinked into Cas's startled blue gaze. He did _not_ drop the other man's hand.

The other dancers swirled around them, somehow achieving the impossible and fading into background nonsense. The only thing that Dean saw in that moment was the broken, fierce, fascinating man in front of him.

Cas's fingers tightened around his. "Dean," he whispered. Dean shifted closer, so their bodies were nearly pressed together, mouths centimeters apart.

"Yeah?" He leaned forward, closing the last few centimeters between them -

And Castiel was gone, leaving Dean stumbling forward into the now-empty air. He looked up in time to see a dark-headed figure disappearing out the front door.

"Dean!"

Someone was tugging at his sleeve. Someone had been tugging at his sleeve for a few seconds already. Dean turned to find Ash staring up at him, a semi-terrified smile on his face. "What?" Dean snarled.

"That Angel Tablet, dude," Ash whispered. "I know what it is."

"And?"

"And whoever's gotten you mixed up in it? My guess? They're out to get you killed."


	5. Chapter 5

"You ever done a charcoal rubbing?"

Dean blinked at the shorter man. Ash was lounging behind his computer setup in Ellen's back room, the light from the screen illuminating his face, painting his features in a pasty, ghoulish light. The rest of the lights were off, and Dean had already run into the table twice. He could feel the bruises beginning to bloom across his skin.

Between that, and Cas's abrupt departure two minutes before, he was not in a good mood.

"Charcoal rubbing?"

"Like what kids, do, man. Old-school detective work. You rub a piece of charcoal across a pad of paper and you can see what someone wrote on the sheet above it. The indentations, you know?"

"Can we skip to any kind of a point? I'd really like to be drowning myself in a whiskey bottle right now."

"The thing about charcoal rubbings," Ash continued as though Dean hadn't even spoken, "is that they work 'cuz you're filling in the information _around_ what you want to actually know. You end up reading the hole, right? The missing spaces. Your Angel Tablet is all missing spaces, compadre."

"Ash -"

"Okay, okay. Basically, no one's talking about this whatever-it-is. But they're not talking about it in such a specific way that, if you're a genius like a certain beautiful bastard in this room, it reads as easy as _A Brief History of Time._"

"What's -"

"It's everything. The Angel Tablet. Is everything." There was a silence as Dean tried to parse through Ash's words. "At least as far as the Operatives are concerned," Ash continued, kicking his feet up onto the table. "This is the be-all, end-all of their whole setup. And turns out, it's gone walkabout." His gaze was deceptively lazy as it swept over Dean. "Wouldn't happen to know anything about that, El Capitan?"

"What the gorram hell is it, Ash?"

"It's a Rolodex. Like one of those Earth-That-Was Rolodexes, with all the names and contacts. But instead of, like, everyone in your local co-op, it's the Operative lineup."

"You mean... it's a who's who?"

"You're not listening. It's _everything_. Who they are, how to find them... what they've done. Mission logs, faces, aliases..."

"Everything."

"Everything. They've gotta want that thing back bad. Like, bloody-slash-and-burn-bad. Because -" Ash broke off, rubbing his hands together. " - it's not just the current roster, either. It's the kids who will be, you know, the ones they want to pull in to the whole shady-government-agent business. Something like this gets out... bye-bye Operatives." He shook his head. "'Course, you'd need to find someone to unlock it for you."

"_Find_ someone - it can't be that hard -"

"Those agents know what they're doing, Dean. Getting info out of the Tablet ain't gonna be a walk in the park. You'd need to find just the right person to read it, and even then they'll be wrestling with the coding on the thing forever. And before you ask - 'cuz I don't even want that sort of incriminating question floating around - I don't have a whore's hope in hell of reading something like that Tablet. I'm good, but I ain't that specialized."

Dean blinked at Ash, feeling the information settling into the crevices of his brain. "That's a helluva charcoal rubbing, Ash."

"Hey, what did Ellen tell you? You're talking to the best."

**xXx**

Dean didn't return to the Impala that evening. In fact, he spent the whole night stretched out on the roof of the Roadhouse, counting stars, fighting sleep, and feeling Ash's words bounce around in the corners of his head.

This Angel Tablet was big league business. Superficially he'd known that for a few days now - no way a high-powered douche bag like Michael went chasing off after any old missing relic. But there was a difference between knowing something and _knowing_ something. And now he understood just how deep the pile of shit they were in was.

Thing of it was, Operatives were basically nightmare legends to most people in the 'verse. There were whispers of them, but nothing more - no one had any proof that they actually existed, and no one was particularly keen on digging into the myths. They flitted from story to story, conjured up to explain mysterious disappearances and strange phenomenons. In the tall tales that kids would tell one another, they were nine feet tall and had muscles like steel cords. They could shoot lasers out of their eyes and read your mind and turn you into dust soon as look at you.

Growing up chasing from one corner of the sky to the other, Dean had entertained the concept of Operatives with a bit more sense of reality than most other kids his age. Shit he'd seen - shit he and Sammy and their dad had stumbled across - yeah, maybe there was no other explanation than a couple of Alliance suited monkeys swooping in to fix situations_ just so_ before disappearing into the black once more. Hell, Dean was convinced he'd met an Operative or two, once or twice - there had always been something slightly _off_ about them, something not quite on this level of existence.

So meeting Castiel and learning what he was... wasn't as much of a shock as it might have been. Cas fit the Operatives profile that Dean had sketched out to the letter in so many ways - he was disconnected, a fierce fighter, logical and precise...

But in so many other was, Cas was different. Dean mulled over their discussion of home, only a few hours back. The man had seemed so quietly sad, nostalgic, almost, for something he'd never even known. "Imperviousness to pain and emotion is cut into us," he'd said (and really? "Imperviousness"? Did anyone actually speak like that?) But the emotion and pain had almost _blazed_ out of his eyes when he'd spoken. Maybe it hadn't been cut in as deep as he thought. Cut in from childhood. From such a young age...

There was something there, behind those words, that rang alarms in Dean's skull... but the night was so warm, and he was so comfortable on the roof and sleep was beckoning...

He dropped off, sleeping so soundly that he didn't see the dark shape of the ship landing several miles outside of town.

**xXx**

"Dean."

Dean turned onto his side, away from the intruding voice. "No."

"_Dean."_

"Go 'way, Sammy."

"I am not your brother. Wake up, Dean."

The gravel in the voice finally registered - Dean's eyes snapped open and he pushed himself to a sitting position.

Castiel was crouched next to him on the roof, staring at him with too much intensity for so early in the morning. His cheeks were flushed, his hair stood up every which way, as though he'd just come from an intense workout - in fact, Dean could see droplets of sweat running down his temples, making for the hollow of his throat. Dean tamped back an exasperated groan. Of course the bastard would look good all sweaty and mussed.

"What, did you run a marathon on your way here?"

"Nothing so strenuous," Cas replied, dropping from a crouch into a proper sitting position. "But I felt the need to clear my head. Running helps me. It is something I am unable to do often while I am traveling, so it becomes something of a luxury."

"I'm surprised you didn't try to run yourself off the edge of the planet last night."

"That is impossible."

"Seemed like you were up for giving it the old try, speed you barged through those doors. You take my meaning. Don't pull that purposeful asshole routine on me now, Cas. I got a boatload of questions, and you owe me some answers."

Cas wasn't meeting his eyes, but Dean caught the slight inclination of his head. "That is why I am here."

"Well... good." Honestly, Dean had expected a bit more of a struggle on the subject. Up until this moment, trying to get information out of Castiel had been about as easy as trying to make oragami out of stone.

"May I begin with an apology?" Cas asked. "For my rather abrupt departure last night? It, uh." -Dean tried to stop himself from staring, because over the last few days he had never, ever heard Castiel stammer - "situations such as that... require a sort of bravery I find that I... am lacking."

"Bravery."

"Yes. Forming bonds with others is an area in which I have approximately zero experience. Running seemed to be the most sensible option at the time."

Dean snorted. "It was something, all right," he said. "I don't know about 'sensible'."

"Neither do I," Cas replied, fixing Dean with that penetrating stare again. "Not anymore."

It was all too much - here, on this rooftop in Lawrence with this man who had brought nothing but chaos and destruction into his life. Dean blinked, but dragging himself out of the man's gaze was like trying to battle his way through a field of toffee. "Where are you hiding the Angel Tablet."

The words croaked their way out of his throat, hoarse and necessary. All the shimmering warmth drained from Cas's face, his mouth hardening into a straight line. "You said you were here to answer my questions," Dean reminded him, easing a crick out of his neck. "This is the big one."

"You don't know what you're digging into."

"Angel Tablet - stores all the nasty little secrets about how the Operatives... operate," Dean supplied, wincing at the redundancy in his words. "Who, what, where, when, why - everything all in one place. One place only you know about it." He leaned forward, making sure that Castiel couldn't look away again. "You brought this thing into my life, Cas. I need to know where it is so I can help you protect it. Or destroy it. Whichever you want to do."

That warmth flooded back into Cas's face, nearly making Dean catch his breath. Without a word, the Operative reached for the hem of his shirt, slowly raising it.

"Whoa -" Dean protested. "I didn't mean -"

But he shut up when he saw the thin line carved into Castiel's side - an incision several inches across, sealed over but still bright red against the seeming-acres of the man's tanned skin. The mark was recent. And it looked damn painful.

"You're keeping it inside of you?" Dean asked, trying not to squeak with astonishment.

Cas shrugged. "It seemed to be the most sensible option at the time," he repeated

"Buddy, we need to work on your definition of 'sensible'. Didn't your superspy teachers tell you not to go sticking strange objects into your chest cavity?"

Castiel lowered the hem of his shirt, the corners of his lips twitching. "Operatives are taught from a young age that our bodies are nothing more than tools to be used for the greater good of society."

"Doesn't mean you should use your own self as a treasure chest," Dean grumbled. Then something the man said hit a bulls-eye in his recollection. "Hold on," he said. "From how young an age?"

"What?"

"How young are Operatives when they are taken away from their families?"

Cas met his eyes, grave understanding beginning to dawn in his gaze. "Six months," he said. "Give or take a few weeks."

The words washed over Dean like ice water. "Sonuvabitch," he whispered.

"Hey! You up there, you idjit?"

That was Bobby's unmistakeable 'we're in for some serious crap' tone. Dean crawled to the edge of the roof to find Bobby looking up at him, face a rictus of concern. "What is it?"

"The Impala had some visitors last night," Bobby said. "Some not-so-friendly friends of ours. Crowley and his boys."

"Wu De Ma," Dean swore. "Did they take anything?"

"Yeah," Bobby said. "Meg."

**xXx**

The bridge should have felt crowded with the entire crew there. But even with Bobby, Bela, Charlie, Sam, Dean, and Cas all in attendance, the place felt overlarge and cavernous without the pilot and her massive personality. Despite the lack of seating, no one sat in Meg's chair.

"They sliced through the security panel outside the cargo bay doors," Charlie said. Her typically cheerful face was serious. "Looks like laser burn. Wouldn't have taken a lot of effort to get the doors open after that."

"There wasn't any one else on-board last night?" Dean asked, glancing around the room.

"I crashed at the Roadhouse," Bobby said.

"Was with Jo," Charlie said.

"Jess. That... medic," Sammy said, blushing.

Dean fixed Bela with a look - the woman was avoiding his gaze. "I may have spent the evening with Deputy Henrickson," she said. Dean cocked an eyebrow. _ How on-the-straight-and-narrow of you_, he thought, making a mental note to tease her in less dire times.

"I did not return to the Impala last night," Cas said quietly.

"No, you were busy running laps around Lawrence," Dean said. "Alright. First thing's first - we need to find out what Crowley wants with Meg."

"Revenge, perhaps?" Bela asked. "The pair of them are not exactly on friendly terms."

"Crowley's petty," Sam replied, "but he's not that petty. If he broke in here and kidnapped someone, then he's got something bigger planned."

"Oh, well done! Give the Moose a cookie."

The slimy voice oozed over the comm system, and Dean suppressed an angry shudder. Reaching over Meg's empty chair, he flicked on the video display, bringing Crowley's smarmy smiling face onto the monitor. "Breaking into my baby?" he growled. "You really have a death wish, Crowley."

"Such bravado, Captain," Crowley chirped. "You know, when you get all grumbly, it stirs things in me that you wouldn't believe."

"Where's Meg?"

"Don't you worry about little Miss Masters," Crowley said. "She's here with me. In fact - say hello, Margaret!"

He tilted the and there was Meg, sprawled on the floor, bound and gagged. There was blood caked down the side of her face, flowing from a nasty-looking head wound, and Dean could see bruises beginning to flower on her arms and wrists. But her dark eyes shone with a familiar ferocity that made Dean fight back a smile. It would take more than a little duct tape to keep Meg down.

Even as he thought that, Meg let loose a stream of muffled consonants that, were she not gagged, would probably have had Dean's ears scalding. Instead, Crowley just aimed a kick at her side and lightly chided "Language, whore," as she curled in on herself.

"What do you want, Crowley?" Dean grated.

"An even trade," Crowley responded, returning his attention to Dean. "A life for a life. You see, I have it on good authority that you have a certain passenger on-board." Without thinking, Dean shifted to make sure that Castiel was blocked completely by Dean's body. "I am in contact with some people who are quite concerned with the whereabouts and well-being of said passenger. If I am able to deliver him... well, I would be a rather wealthy man indeed. So I propose an exchange - your spunky little pilot here for that human-shaped thorn in your side. I'd say you might even come out of this better than I will."

"And if we don't want to deal?" Dean asked.

"Well then... Miss Masters has a long and rather fascinating future of learning what her own insides look like."

"We'll do it."

Castiel stepped out from behind Dean before Dean could stop him.

"Oh my, my my," Crowley drawled, sauntering closer to the camera. "The infamous Castiel, I take it." He squinted mockingly. "Really, I was anticipating something much more intimidating."

"Tell us where to find you and I will be there," Cas said, his voice as stony as his face.

"Cas -"

"I appreciate your concern, Captain, but you need to think of your crew," Castiel said, not looking back at Dean. "Your location, Mr. Crowley. Please."

Crowley regarded Castiel for a long moment, obviously not certain whether or not he was being played. "Ten miles east of the old Winchester house," he said finally. "Come alone. Two hours."

And the video feed flickered off before Dean could utter another protest.

**xXx**

If there was one thing that Crowley liked to travel in, it was style. His ship was immense and sleek, with none of the old-school charm of the Impala. Anything that could be made to shine shone. Anything that could be convinced to gleam gleamed. The whole affair was entirely modern, contemporary, and - to Dean, at least - disgustingly ostentatious. As he took the ship in, he couldn't help but utter a quiet snort.

His brother quickly hushed him. "Oh, come on, Sammy," Dean whispered. "Look at this thing!"

A truly remarkable bitchface was his only response, but Dean was spared the necessity of kicking his brother's ass as Charlie's voice piped up in their ears. "Okay," the mechanic said. "Now if I remember this model right, there should be an external panel that slides back just two yards to the left of the primary exhaust valve. Do you see it?"

Dean ran his hands over the slick metal of the ship's exterior wall. "What am I looking for?"

"The crack between panels should be slightly wider than the other ones," Charlie replied. "It's a design flaw, but not a fatal one."

"Found it," Sam said, wedging his fingers into the crack.

"Great," Charlie said. "Now pull -" Sam started pulling, his efforts drowning out the sound of Charlie's continued "- _carefully_!" The panel snapped off, throwing Sam into the underbrush and revealing a crawlspace just big enough for a man to wedge himself into beyond.

"Stop lying around, Sammy," Dean needled. "We got work to do." He squeezed himself into the crawlspace, and after a few dusty moments, Sam followed him.

"Keep going for about twenty yards," Charlie whispered, "then I'll let you know what to do. Hold on, I have to check on Bela."

"Are you sure about this, Dean?" Sam whispered as they made their grimy way along the crawlspace. "Maybe we just should'a let Cas take this fall. I mean, we've seen him in action - the guy can take care of himself."

"Kinda late in the game-plan for this," Dean retorted, wincing as he set his hand down in something slimy and organic.

"We could be getting Meg killed over this," Sam continued, ignoring his brother. "And I know you like the guy and everything, but Cas isn't exactly one of us, you know? Aside from being on the Alliance's 'naughty' list, what do we have in common with him?"

_Six months old..._

Dean clenched his jaw against the words. "Just don't seem right to leave him dangling in Crowley's hands," he just said stubbornly.

"_I don't like this, Dean," Castiel had said._

"_Yeah, yeah," Dean had replied, checking his pockets for his extra clips. "Heard you the first ten million times, but good to know where you stand. Again."_

"_Dean. Please." Cas had grabbed his arm, forcing Dean's attention onto him. "Your crew has done enough for me - this is the least I can do to repay you."_

"_Would you stow it, Cas?" Dean retorted. "I know as well as you do that the ass-monkey holding Crowley's leash here is Michael. And what do you think he'll do to you as soon as he lays his hands on?"_

"_Nothing I'm not entirely sure I don't deserve."_

"_Blah, blah, self-sacrifice and guilt - I know the tune, Cas. I've sung it a thousand times. And like I said - stow it. You're not going with him, and that's final."_

"There should be a grate on your right." Charlie's voice filtered through the comms, jolting Dean out of his thoughts.

"Cut through that and you should be in one of the aft service corridors. You bring a laser?"

"After what they did to Baby?" Dean muttered. "Yeah, I brought a laser. I'll laser this bitch up."

It was the work of a second (a highly satisfying second) to melt the chrome grating to nothing. Dean and Sam each gripped part of the mesh and lowered it soundlessly to the floor before following the grate out into the hallway.

"It's dark," Dean said into the comm.

"Sorry," Charlie responded. "Bela's not ready yet. If she was -"

"Don't worry about it," Sam said, elbowing Dean in the side. "Just tell us which way to Crowley."

"_The dumb sonuvabitch parked her right in the middle of the gorram forest," Dean muttered, peering at the shiny bulk of Crowley's ship through the trees. _

"_Points for the difficulty of the landing," Charlie agreed, inspecting the ship as well, "but minus one hundred for security issues." She grinned up at Dean. "We're going to take advantage of his stupidity, aren't we?"_

"_Darlin'," Dean replied, patting her shoulder, "we are going to do that in a big way."_

Charlie's directions were nearly unnecessary. After the first turn, all Sam and Dean had to do was follow the sound of raised voices - one lilting, low and female, and one bubbling with rising frustration. Dean bit back a smile - someone had removed Meg's gag, and she was taking advantage of her sharp tongue's new-found freedom to rile Crowley up. _Good_, Dean thought. A frustrated Crowley was a careless Crowley.

"Keep talking, big boy," he heard Meg drawl. "Eventually someone, someday will start listening to you."

"I should cut your lips off, you arrogant slut," Crowley hissed. Meg's chuckle reverberated down the hallway towards Sam and Dean.

"Promises, promises," she said, but any other quips she may have planned were cut off by the sound of a hard thunk- the sickening noise of a fist meeting flesh.

"Alright -" Dean started for the entrance, but Sam grabbed his arm.

"Hold up -"

But the sound of punches continued, and Dean shook his head. "No way, Sammy," he said.

The door slid open before he even touched it, and Dean found himself staring down the barrel of at least four guns - and into Crowley's blood-splattered face.

"Hello, boys," Crowley said. "So glad you could join us."

"_You understand the plan?" Dean had said, watching as Bela made the final adjustments to her black catsuit._

_She'd shot him a withering look. "Please darling," she said. "I have only the highest level of confidence in you as a Captain, but this is hardly the most complicated heist I've ever pulled. If I get caught, I will simply die of shame."_

_Dean forced a smile he hadn't quite felt. "Well okay then."_

_He hadn't been expecting the cool hand laid on his cheek and looked up into Bela's calm green eyes. "We will be fine," she told him. "We will get Meg back and Castiel will be prevented from his charming little martyr routine and we will all sail off into the sunset together."_

"_Yeah?"_

"_We have to," Bela said simply, before sliding into her wicked charming smile. "Anyway, if we lose Meg, I will be forced to resort to sparring with _you_. And then I might just faint from boredom."_

Crowley hadn't been foolish enough to keep Meg trussed up on the bridge or in the engine room, or anyplace else where she might have gotten free and caused maximum damage to his ship. Instead they were in an empty room - it had probably been intended as guest quarters, but the space had been re-purposed for Crowley's gruesome "working environment". The floors were bare, as were the walls - in fact, the room was completely empty except for Crowley, Meg, and the four thug-like goons with their guns trained on Sam and Dean.

"If I find out that you two mutton-heads have torn a hole in my ship," Crowley said conversationally, "then I shall be terribly angry."

"Yeah, really broken up about it, I can tell," Dean said. Crowley gave him a tense smile - and backhanded Meg, who was crouched on the floor at his feet.

"What the hell was that for?" spat the pilot.

"The thing about the Winchesters," Crowley said, crossing his arms, "is that direct pressure is rarely effective. They have such a dreadfully tenuous sense of self-preservation. No, the way to get your brave captain to do what I want - is to break _you_."

He drew back his hand to land another punch - but one of the goons suddenly spoke up. "Sir," the beefy thug said. "He's here. Outside."

"Pull it up on the monitor," Crowley ordered. He removed a handkerchief from his pocket and began mopping Meg's blood off his face. The thug crossed to a wall panel and hit a few buttons. In a moment, part of the wall flickered with light, resolving into an image - the view from Crowley's cargo bay doors. And standing in front of those doors... was Castiel.

"That stupid idiot," Dean muttered. "He's gonna get himself killed."

Crowley's face split in an excited smile. "Well isn't this a turn-up for the old books," he said. "I reckon this wasn't part of your dashing, heroic plan, was it Captain?" Dean avoided Crowley's eyes, which just made Crowley cackle with glee. "Bring up the sound, idiot," he snapped at the thug.

A few more button-pushes, and suddenly Cas's voice was filtering through the comms. "I'm here!" he was shouting. "Crowley, you son of a bitch, I'm here!"

"Son of a bitch?" Sam mouthed to Dean.

"He's been spending too much time with you, Cap," Meg croaked from the floor.

"Lovely of you to pay us a visit, Castiel," Crowley said into the comm. "If you wouldn't mind hanging tight for just one moment, I will be right with you."

He turned back to the battered crew of the Impala with a sharkish smile. "Looks like it's about time to wrap this little party up," he said. "Davis, if you would?"

One of the thugs stepped forward, a blank look on his face and Meg's switchblade shining in his hand. The lights flickered - just once, just briefly, fast enough to nearly miss it. Dean felt a sense of relief flood through him. _ I'll never doubt you again, Bela,_ he thought.

"What happened to the fair trade?" Dean asked, eyes on the blade. "Cas is here - aren't you supposed to be letting Meg go?"

"Yes, well, that was before you _tore a hole in the side of my ship,_" Crowley yelled, his calm mask slipping for just a moment. Deep breath - he gathered himself together again. "So no, Captain, there will be no trade. Instead, I am going to have Davis carve your throat out. And then I am going to deliver your dark-haired friend out there to people who - to the best of my knowledge - would like to see him in several pieces, scattered across the galaxy. And then I am going to collect my reward and retire from this life of crime and never, ever think about you again." He sighed happily. "Actually, it's a pretty top-notch day to be Crowley. Davis, my lad. Work your magic."

But Davis never even had a chance to raise the switchblade. The vents set into the walls whirred to life, sucking all air out of the room in a single, vacuuming gulp. Even Dean, who had been expecting it, was flooded with panic at the sudden sensation of airlessness.

Crowley's eyes bugged out of his head. "What -" he tried to gasp, but there was no air to waste on words. Instead, he staggered to the door panel and slid the door open.

Air rushed into the impromptu torture chamber - and the electrical outlets on the wall exploded into sparks and flame, searing up the pristine white walls and blackening the ceiling. "Out!" Crowley shouted. His thugs were quick to follow him from the room, Sam and Dean hauling Meg to her feet and trailing after them.

As they ran through the hallways, lights exploded, air vents spat gale-force winds at them, and fire raged from every inch of wiring buried deep in the plaster. "What the bloody hell did you do?" Crowley raged at Dean and Sam as he pelted full-speed towards the cargo bay.

The bay itself was blessedly free of chaos. Crowley skidded to a halt in the middle of the open floor, whirling on Sam, Dean and Meg. "You assholes," he hissed. "I'll kill you myself."

"I wouldn't do that, darling." Bela vaulted from the catwalk into the cargo bay and landed between Dean and Crowley with feline grace. "It would be only too easy to send this entire hunk of bourgeois trash up in flames the instant you laid hands on them."

"How are you -"

"The thing about the classics," Bela continued as though Crowley hadn't even begun speaking, "is that they are nearly impossible to remotely hijack. If I tried to gain third-person access to the Impala, for example, I would most likely wind up with nothing but frustration and Captain Winchester's bullet in my skull. Your ship on the other hand," and she gestured at the chrome splendor that surrounded them, "is equipped to fly with minimal crew and maximum flash. All it takes is a little hands-on tinkering with your system by a technological genius," and she tapped at the comm in her ear, "and your ship is as good as ours."

"You _bitch_," Crowley spat, but Bela just grinned.

"Open the bay door, Charlie," she said.

With a screeching groan, the massive doors slid aside, revealing the anticipated Castiel... backed by Bobby, Ellen, Rufus, Jo, and a host of other Lawrence locals. Each member of Crowley's welcoming committee had a sidearm aimed at the criminal's head.

"Oh for God's sake," Crowley muttered. "I've been Winchestered."

**xXx**

"How long do you think you can hold him?" Dean asked Ellen as Deputy Henrickson led Crowley and his crew towards the ground transport. Meg leaned against the loading bay doors next to him, tossing her switchblade from hand to hand. It seemed as though Crowley's beat-down hadn't done much to damage her dexterity. "I mean, before the Alliance comes looking."

"Don't be a gorram fool," Ellen scolded. "Alliance never comes looking out here. We've got Crowley as long as we damn well please."

"Sounds like paradise to me," Dean said. "Meg, where are you -"

Meg had pushed away from the wall and was marching towards the bound Crowley with a determined look in her eye. Dean moved a few steps after her, but Ellen stopped him.

"She's gonna -" Dean began, but Ellen cut him off.

"She deserves it," Ellen said. They watched as Meg swung to a halt in front of Crowley, smiled sweetly up at him... and plunged her switchblade into his bicep. Dean winced. Crowley howled. Henrickson bundled the criminal into the transport and Meg glared after it as it drove away, wiping her switchblade on her jeans.

"Thank you, Captain."

As usual, Castiel seemed to materialize out of thin air next to Dean. Ellen gave Dean a significant glance before bustling off to fuss over Charlie and Jo. Dean raised an eyebrow at the Operative.

"You called Crowley a 'son of a bitch'," he said.

Castiel shrugged. "I was feeling inspired."

"It was a good performance."

"Thank you." Castiel sighed. "But I fear -"

"When are you gonna stop trying to leave us?" Dean cut him off.

Cas looked at him, shocked. "Dean -"

"Don't play like those ain't the words chasing around in your head. 'Dean, I have to go, I have Important Operative Things to do'." Dean privately complimented himself on his Castiel impression. "Michael knows you're here. He knows who I am and who I care about. I'm involved. So if I'm gonna get killed by some Alliance douche-nozzle, I might as well get killed for something I'm actually responsible for." He grinned Cas, lop-sided. "Us Winchesters don't take kindly to getting shot dead over a gorram misunderstanding. We like to piss our killers off before they finish us."

"I've noticed that," Castiel said dryly.

"We're together on this, Cas. You and me and whatever you got stuck in your chest - which I'm still not over, by the way, that ain't right. Maybe even my crew, too, but I'm not gonna speak for them. So stop trying to ditch out on us, and start working _with_ us. What do you say?"

Cas looked at him, bewildered, as though he didn't know what to do with the acceptance that Dean was throwing his way. Finally he sighed. "Well, I'll go with you," he said.

Dean beamed, clapping Cas on the shoulder. "Glad to hear it," he said. "What's the next step on the Angel Tablet Farewell Tour?"

"Back to the Core," Cas told him somberly. "We need to break the encryption."

"And who can do that?"

"Only one person," Cas replied. "His name is Kevin Tran. He's... in Advanced Placement."


	6. Chapter 6

The mess was empty, except for Sammy the mammoth, who was at the stove preparing more tea than Dean had ever contemplated in his entire life. Dean watched him for a long moment - watched the tiny crease between his brother's brows as he measured spoonful after spoonful of dried leaves into various pots, watched his careful fingers screw the lid back on the tea jar, watched his eyebrows lift towards his hairline as he noticed Dean standing in the doorway.

"What?" Sam asked. "I got something on my face?"

Words itched at the back of Dean's throat - _six months old, they take them when they're six months old..._ but he fought them back, coughing slightly. "You seen the others?" he asked. "I need to talk to you all."

"About Cas."

"About... yeah. Where we stand."

After living the majority of his life within two yards of him, Dean was fluent in the nonverbal language of Sam Winchester. The grim nod the younger man gave him spoke volumes. _You know, don't you?_ Dean thought. _At least... you suspect. _ He remembered back to the conversation he had interrupted with Sam and Castiel. His brother had known there was something different about him... and he'd known that Cas had the answers.

Sometimes it was too, too easy to forget that Sam was a gorram genius.

"Heard some people in the engine room," Sam said, and the moment of Dean's realization took backseat to more pressing matters. "Charlie, and maybe Meg. Don't know about Bobby. Or Bela."

"I'll go wrangle Charlie," Dean said. "You get Bobby and Bela on the comms and tell them to get their asses back here _yesterday_. We got shit to talk about."

"Yes, sir," Sammy said. His slightly mocking tone did not take the edge off the memories summoned by those words - memories of Sam delivering them blank-faced in the onslaught of John Winchester's drunken fury. But before Dean could call his brother out on the underhanded tactic, Sam had already taken off for the bridge.

The short walk to the engine room was not nearly enough time to clear Dean's head. His brain was still spinning with "yes, sir" and every other gorram thing that had happened in the last few days. Between nightmares, the Angel Tablet, his unceremonious return to Lawrence, whateverthefuck he had going with Castiel, and crawling through the rat-tunnels of Crowley's chrome-plated monstrosity of a boat... he was having a hard time remembering his own name, let alone formulating a plan for how they were going to get from their current point A to wherever point B was. His thoughts were still spinning in circles by the time he pulled to a stop outside the "love keeps her in the air" sign on the engine room door.

"_Love keeps her in the air"?_

_Dean didn't even try to keep the scorn out of his voice as he read the sign on the mechanic's transpo. His mood was foul enough - bits were falling off the Impala faster than he could glue his Baby back together, and all indicators told him that the boat he'd called home for... hell, most of his life was on her last legs._

"_Don't start with me, boy," Bobby growled at him from behind his beard. They watched from the cargo bay door as a slim figure in coveralls and an oversized cap pulled low scrambled around inside the transpo, pulling together what amounted to a fairly sparse tool kit from the bits and pieces scattered around the seats. "Pastor Jim says this Charlie's the best mechanic he's ever seen."_

"_Need more than sunshine and rainbows to keep a boat together," Dean grumbled. "I mean, look at this guy, Bobby. He can't be more than fourteen. How's he supposed to keep the Impala running if he can't even keep a handle on a box of screwdrivers?"_

_As if to prove his point, the slight mechanic dropped his tool kit to the ground with a massive crash. "No way, man," Dean muttered. "I can't watch this. We need a gorram miracle to get Baby off the ground again, and Boy Wonder over there is useless." He headed back into the belly of the Impala. "'Least he can't break her any more than she's already been broken."_

"_Dean -" Bobby called after him, but Dean just waved an arm over his head._

"_Let me know if we're gonna explode. I'll be on the bridge."_

_They hadn't exploded. In fact, thirty minutes later as Dean sat in the pilot's chair, glowering at nothing, he'd felt the engine rumble to life, the floor vibrating gently in that familiar way beneath his booted feet. Dean sat up straight, eyebrows quirking together. _

_The Impala had been beyond repair. That last sprint out of Alliance airspace had fried her cooling system. Two mechanics had told Dean she'd never be wheels-up again. And yet..._

_Didn't take long for Dean to make it to the engine room. Sure enough, the engine was spinning, glowing, healthy and strong in a way he hadn't seen in years. Taking a moment to appreciate the sight of his Baby doing so well, Dean saw a pair of small, tennis-shoe-clad feet sticking out from underneath the engine. He marched over to them, kicking one lightly. "Hey."_

_A slender woman scootched her way out from under the machinery, face smudged with engine grease, smiling like a kid in Candyland. "Hey yourself," she said back. "This is an amazing boat you got here, let me tell you. Honestly, if I could, I'd spend all day underneath her - and I haven't felt that way since I met my first Companion. It's a real honor to be able to work on something like this."_

"_Uh -" Dean held out a hand, stopping the torrent of words. "Who are you?"_

"_Oops!" The woman hopped to her feet, and Dean could see that, aside from oil, her coveralls were covered in characters from old Earth-That-Was comic books (the kinds he swore up and down he never read 'course not that stash under his bunk wasn't his just holding it for a friend). "Sorry. Guess your beardy friend didn't tell you - I'm Charlie."_

"_You're Charlie."_

"_Bradbury. Charlie Bradbury."_

_Her hand was just... out there. Dean realized it had been outstretched for several solid seconds before his brain kicked into gear enough to take it and give it a firm shake. "Was that a James Bond reference?"_

_Charlie's smile widened. "Bulls-eye!" she exclaimed. "Got it in one!" Dean felt an answering smile stretch his lips._

"_I should tell ya, Charlie, that two different mechanics said that the Impala would never be running again," Dean informed her. "But you seemed to have proved them wrong."_

"_It's kind of a habit of mine," Charlie said, shrugging. "Anyway, it would be such a damn shame to let a boat as beautiful as this sit junked. Ship like your Impala - she deserves all the love you can give her."_

"_Damn straight," Dean agreed. He considered the woman for a moment, taking in the brightness of her expression, the griminess of her coveralls, the way her fingers twitched like they itched to get back to work. "How'd you like to come work for me?" he blurted out before he could stop himself._

_Charlie stared. "What?"_

"_Onboard. As my mechanic." He shrugged, feeling helpless. "Baby likes you. You seem like good people. And we could use someone who can keep us in the air."_

_Charlie's face remained impassive for a heartstopping second - then she rushed at Dean all of a moment and threw her arms around him, squeezing hard. "I just gotta grab my things!" she exclaimed, muffled, into his shoulder, before releasing him so fast that he stumbled and dashing for the door._

"_Leave that dumb sign behind!" Dean called after her._

That dumb sign swung aside with the door as Dean pushed into the engine room. Three pale faces looked up at him - Meg, Charlie, and Bela were all grouped together, Meg and Charlie on the tool bench and Bela kneeling on the ground. The thief was cleaning and bandaging the wounds on Meg's arms while Charlie stroked her hair - a strangely soothing and gentle gesture from someone who spent most of her time wrenching at pieces of metal.

The glare that Bela aimed in Dean's direction could have sliced through him. "Can we help you, Captain?"

"Uh..." Dean's eyes flicked from face to face, taking in Bela's fiercely protective anger, Charlie's gentle, kind empathy, and Meg's disconcertingly blank look.

"Dean?" Charlie prompted.

"Crew meeting," Dean said. _Had that gash on Meg's temple always been that deep, or had he just not been paying attention before?_ "In the mess. When you're, uh, ready."

It was not common for Charlie, Meg, and Bela to close ranks on him like this. Dean guessed it was some sort of woman-thing, but he didn't dare say anything like that aloud - he just knew that a damn fool move like that would practically be an invitation for Bela to shove one of Charlie's tools into his eye socket.

"We'll be up shortly," Bela told him, her words clipped. Dean nodded at them, then hauled ass out of the engine room as quickly as he could.

Once he got to the cargo bay, he took a moment to breathe. Whatever Meg was going through - whatever her ordeal with Crowley had brought swimming to the surface of her memory - he knew that Bela and Charlie would be able to bring her through it. Still. The fact that a member of his crew was hurting and he couldn't do a gorram thing about it... well, that didn't sit quite right with him.

He leaned back against one of the crates strapped to the wall, pinching the bridge of his nose. Maybe his life would have been easier if he'd just stuck to simple salvage and smuggling.

_He hadn't succeeded in suppressing a surprised yelp when one of the shadows behind the crates had come alive, detaching itself from the surrounding darkness and slinking out to the cargo bay floor. In fact, the shadow turned out not to even be not a shadow at all, but rather a tall, slim woman in a black catsuit who regarded him and the cargo bay with a proprietary air. "Yes," she murmured, blatantly ignoring Dean. "This will do quite nicely."_

_She only deigned to look at Dean, Sam, and Bobby when the sound of their guns being cocked drew her attention. "Oh," she said. "Hello."_

"_Who in the seven hells are you?" Dean demanded. The woman simply rolled her eyes, which made Dean dislike her even more. He had a natural distrust of people who disregarded guns aimed at their important bits._

"_My name is Bela Talbot," said Bela Talbot, holding out a hand to shake like she was at a gorram garden party. "You must be Captain Winchester."_

_No one lowered their weapons. "What the hell are you doing on the Impala?" Sam asked. For someone who had so recently given up pens and books for firearms, he'd fallen back into his old competent habits quickly - he held that gun like he knew how to use it. _

"_Ran into a spot of trouble back on Ariel," Bela said. "Officials do get so worked up about a little light theft. Thought you gentlemen might want to help a damsel in distress make a quick getaway."_

"_I don't see no damsels here," Bobby growled._

"_Really? I see three of them." Bela laughed, light, sparkling, and utterly deadly. "Forgive my attempt to lighten the mood, but I am very pleased to make your acquaintance. And I simply must compliment you on the caliber of your ship. It is a classic, after all - timeless and elegant. Vessels like this never go out of style."_

_A pretty girl complimenting his Baby... Dean felt himself relaxing slightly despite himself. "You got taste, for a stowaway," he grumbled._

"_That I do," Bela agreed. "And I am not a stowaway."_

"_You just hid in our cargo bay while we unknowingly smuggled you past at least three Alliance patrols," Sam pointed out. "That's what a stowaway is. Unless you want to owe us a favor for -"_

"_I don't do debt, darling," Bela said, eyes flashing for a moment. "Here -" she produced a purse and tossed it to Bobby, who caught it one-handed. "That should cover my room and board."_

"_This ain't a motel, sweetheart."_

"_Oh believe me," Bela said. "I know. Quarters are this way?" She began sauntering in that direction without waiting for an answer, taking in her surroundings again as she walked. "This really is a lovely ship. I think I shall be quite happy here."_

"You just gonna nap down there all day, boy?"

Bobby was glaring down at him from the catwalk, expression grumpy even under that ridiculous cap he always wore.

"That was my plan," Dean quipped, pushing himself off the crates and making his way towards the stairs.

"Yeah, well, if I don't get to sleep without you setting Sam to screaming in my ear, you don't either. Where we doing this?"

"Mess. Sammy made a boatload of tea."

"He better," Bobby grumbled as Dean reached him. They set off for the mess in step, footsteps ringing out against the metal of the catwalk. "This about Castiel?"

He shot Bobby a sidelong glance. "What do you think of him?"

"Aw hell, boy, I just -"

"Don't give me that 'I just work here' Go Shi. Come on, Bobby. You're smarter'n most, you've known me my whole life, and even though you like to pretend at being some ancient curmudgeon, you've got a better sense for people than anyone else I know. I wanna know what you think."

"_You're falling apart, boy."_

_Dean looked up at Bobby blearily over his folded arms. It was dark in the mess - he'd barely spent five minutes here total in the last two months - but the older man's silhouette was so familiar that Dean could distinguish Bobby anywhere._

"'_m not," Dean slurred, fighting his way towards an upright sitting position. But the whiskey in his blood set his world to spinning and he uttered a soft "oof" before setting his forehead back down on his arms._

"_Yeah," Bobby scoffed. "Here -" he set a glass of water in front of Dean, who regarded it suspiciously. "When was the last time you drank something that didn't aim to pickle your liver?"_

"_What's the point of that?" Dean muttered, but he took a sip of the water anyway. When he looked up again, Bobby was watching him calmly, steadily._

"_You remind me of your daddy sometimes," Bobby said._

"_Thanks?"_

"_Ain't a compliment. Finish that water."_

_Slightly struck dumb, Dean complied. As he sipped, Bobby began bustling around the mess, flicking on lights and sorting through the cupboards for anything resembling food. He finally succeeded in extracting a bag of rice that Dean had forgotten he'd even had, as well as a pack of protein that was most likely at least three months old (although the expiration date on those closely resembled "never"). Dean watched, impressed, as Bobby began cooking up a real honest-to-gods meal. _

"_Can't remember the last time anyone cooked in here," Dean mumbled._

"_That's damn obvious," Bobby retorted. He reached over and _walloped_ Dean on the back of the head with a wooden spoon._

"_The hell was that for?!" Dean yelped, rubbing at his scalp._

"_For me having to yank your ass out of a jail cell two hours ago, what do you think, you idjit?!" Bobby exclaimed. "I've met some dumbasses in my time, but you take the -"_

"_Yeah, yeah, nobody's making you stick around, you know," Dean said. "Door's that way - feel free to use it any time."_

"_I'm not leaving you, moron," Bobby said, turning back to the stove._

_Dean blinked at him. Maybe it was the whiskey, or maybe it was some damn girly-instinct, but moisture pricked at his eyes at Bobby's words. "You're -"_

"_You're falling apart. Said that already. So's the Impala. Won't last much longer like this."_

"_Yeah," Dean whispered._

"_What with Sam gone... and now your daddy... I figure you could use an extra set of hands around these parts." He turned to fix Dean with a steady, penetrating gaze. "Sound okay to you?"_

"I think you already made up your mind about Castiel," Bobby told Dean. "I think you trust him, in your gut. And I think you don't quite know why."

Dean scrubbed a hand over his face as they turned into the mess. "That's for damn sure."

"But I'll tell you one last thing, boy," Bobby continued. "Your gut built this crew - hell, your gut built this ship. It's hasn't led you wrong yet. So if you're team-Cas... well, that might just be good enough for me." He clapped a hand on Dean's shoulder, just briefly, then glanced around. "Now where's your brother with that damn tea?"

"I'll grab him," Dean said. The air of the mess was feeling just a little close in that moment, his throat just a little tight. He needed to get out from Bobby's quietly proud gaze before he broke down and blubbered like a five-year-old in front of a clown. "Think he's on the bridge."

Sam wasn't at the bridge, but Meg was, plucking her jacket off the back of her chair and sliding it on. The leather sleeves covered her freshly bandaged arms, and she looked up as Dean came in. "We getting ready to start, Cap?"

"_I told you I'll be fine," Dean rasped to Charlie through chattering teeth. "It's just a cold, I can get us to Aurora easy -"_

_He broke off in a fit of coughing, and Charlie had to help him sink into the copilot's chair. She draped a blanket around his shoulders, and he couldn't fight the urge to snuggle into it._

"_Sure, Captain," Charlie said. "Real platform of stability you are right now - you fell asleep in your bao like two minutes ago."_

"_It was boring bao."_

"_Don't let Bobby hear you talking like that." Charlie nudged him. "C'mon, you know we have to make this drop, or Abbadon'll eviscerate us. You can't fly, it's crawling with Alliance... we need a pilot."_

"I'm_ a pilot."_

"_What you are is a walking advertisement for hand sanitizer, Captain."_

_The voice was amused, low, velvety. It came from the mouth of a pocket-sized woman with a heart-shaped face and amused brown eyes. She stood in the door to the bridge with her arms crossed, hip cocked, and a half-smile on her lips. "Meg Masters. It's just an absolute dream to meet you."_

_Dean wanted to glare but his eyes weren't focusing correctly through his sickly haze. "Ruby swears by her," Charlie told him._

"_Yeah, that's reassuring," Dean muttered sarcastically. Trusting Ruby was something he made a point never to do. _

"_Hey, I don't want to cause any trouble," Meg said, with the grin of someone who wanted to do exactly that, "but I heard that you had some bacon needs saving. I'm good at that sort of thing."_

"_Saving bacon."_

"_Among other things. You need to get this hunk of junk to Aurora, I'm your genius."_

"_Hunk of junk?!"_

"_Great," Charlie cut him off. "Why don't you get settled in, and I'll... tuck the Captain into his bunk for the night."_

_Dean had to lean on Charlie to make it down the stairs. "I don't like her," he said. "She's cocky. Cocky don't fly. Literally."_

"_It's just one trip, Captain," Charlie reassured her. "Just 'til you get better. Okay?"_

_Dean cast one last look over his shoulder towards the bridge. Meg Masters - all five feet of her - was settling into the pilot's chair as though she lived there, propping her feet up on the console. He gritted his teeth and looked away. _

"_Okay."_

"Cap?" Meg repeated, cocking an eyebrow at Dean. "You still there?"

She smiled her typical Meg-smile, slow and sensual and lopsided, but there was that flatness behind her eyes that hung on with teeth and claws. "Looking for Sammy," Dean said.

"He went to see a man about a urinal," Meg said, "but he'll meet us in the mess. C'mon, Dean-o, let's not keep your adoring public waiting."

She brushed past him, making for the doorway - Dean caught her arm. "Meg -" he started. "Are, uh, you okay? After what -"

Meg's dark eyes met his, diamond-hard and just as cold. "I'm fine," she said quietly, fiercely. "I'm always fine." Her eyes narrowed. "Never ask me that. Not again. Not ever."

Dean remained transfixed, frozen on the bridge, as Meg strode out the door.

By the time he returned to the mess, the entire crew was gathered - everyone save Sam. Even Castiel was there, sitting quietly in the corner, while Bobby handed out cups of tea and Bela and Charlie traded loud stories. Meg slid onto the seat next to Bela, a little more color returning to her cheeks as she inhaled the steam from the mug Bobby placed in front of her. She even managed to crack a real smile at a story Charlie was telling.

Dean watched from the door for a long moment, just as he had studied Sam earlier. His crew - his team, gathered in the heart of his ship. Broken and battered, but fine. Always fine. What was it Bobby had said? His gut had brought these people together - maybe he could trust himself a little more than he thought he could. The idea eased a tension inside of him that he hadn't known he carried.

Sammy clambered through the door, stopping next to Dean. "You keep staring so long, you're gonna strain something," he quipped like the bitch he was.

Dean shoved him with his shoulder. "Shut up," he said, and nearly stumbled as Sam shoved him back with his overgrown sledgehammer of an arm.

_Dean hit the ground hard, squinting up through the darkness in the mess. The figure above him loomed huge and vast, outlined by the vague light filtering in from the cargo bay._

_But nobody got the drop on Dean in his own ship - not if he could help it. He leveraged a powerful kick at the intruder's stomach, and felt it connect. His attacker let out his breath in a pained "oof!" and Dean took the opportunity to roll the two of them over, getting a good look at the man's face in the dim light._

"_Sammy?"_

"_Get the hell off me, Dean!"_

_Dean jolted backwards, staring down at his brother. "What are you doing here?"_

_It had been four years since they'd spoken - four years since Sam had stood up in the Roadhouse on Lawrence and ripped Dean's heart out of his chest. Now all Dean could do was blink dumbly as Sam pushed himself off the floor and rose (and rose and rose and rose) to his feet._

"_Wu De Ma," Dean swore. "You're a gorram giraffe."_

"_Thanks," Sam deadpanned. "And you're on my planet, remember? I just finished my first year at Helios Law."_

"_Uh -" Dean faltered. "Congratulations? Sammy, why the hell are you sneaking onto my ship in the middle of the night?"_

"_Bobby messaged me," Sam explained, sticking his hands as deep into his jacket pockets as they would go. It was a familiar gesture to Dean, and he nearly smiled at it. His brother might be on his way to becoming a rich-and-powerful lawyer, but there were some things that never changed. "Said you were planetside, and that I should get my head outta my ass and come on by." _

_He shrugged. "Thought you wouldn't agree to see me if I showed up at, y'know, normal visiting hours. Indirect approach sometimes works better."_

"_That all Bobby said?" Dean asked, suspicious._

"_Said you had a new mechanic who keeps this thing flying better than anyone else ever could," Sam said. He was avoiding Dean's eyes. "He said he's trying to feed you three squares a day, but that you're aiming to kill yourself with junk food all the same."_

"_And..."_

"_... And he said Dad's missing. That he's been missing for months now. That he ditched out on you and left you to fly the Impala by yourself."_

_Dean was silent for a moment. "Bobby's got a big mouth on him."_

_Sammy huffed a sigh of agreement, looking around. "Man, I missed this place. Didn't think I would, but... well..." He shrugged._

"_You... want a tour?" Dean asked. Something had sparked in his chest the moment he'd recognized Sam's face, something hopeful and warm. He could feel that spark growing in intensity as their conversation continued. "See if anything's changed since you, y'know..."_

"_Yeah," Sam said, maybe a touch too quickly._

"_Maybe you could stick around a bit and we could catch up," Dean continued. _

_Sam grinned. "I think that's a good idea."_

"You idjits gonna keep trying to knock each other's brains out in civilized company, or can we get this show on the road?" Bobby barked as Sam and Dean tussled in the mess hall entryway. Dean was the one to pull back first, coughing in embarrassment and straightening his clothes.

"Uh - yeah -" he started. "Everyone, thanks for, uh - being here, or coming here -"

"Gold star for your speechwriter, Cap," Meg purred. Dean just rolled his eyes.

"Shut up, Meg. Cas, get up here. We got some decisions to make." Dean looked every member of his crew in the eye - Bobby, gruffly proud; Bela, languidly curious; Meg, defensively fiery; Charlie, brightly inquisitive; and finally Sam - loyal and brave to the end.

"I gotta know now," Dean said clearly, "'cuz there's no going back on this one, I gotta know _now_ - who wants to risk their lives to stick it to the Alliance?"


	7. Chapter 7

"This is stupid, Dean."

Dean winced, messing with the volume control on the comms. "Say that a little louder, Sammy, I think you left one of my eardrums intact."

"It's _stupid_," Sam repeated. Dean couldn't see his brother's face, but he knew the bitchy expression must be turned up to eleven. "You're going in there without backup - without the Impala, even. Why won't you let us come with you?"

"I've got backup," Dean protested, glancing over at his companion. "I've got Cas."

The snort that Sam let echo over the comm-line was more eloquent than a ten-stanza poem.

"I assure you, Sam," Cas said, leaning over to the mic, "that as long as I am around, no harm will come to your brother."

"Thanks, Cas." To Dean's astonishment, Sam actually sounded slightly mollified. "Just - if things heat up down there, you have to let us know, alright? We'll come get you."

"Yeah, yeah," Dean said, flapping a hand that Sam couldn't see. "Keep your panties on you big baby."

"Whatever, jerk." And the line went dead before Dean could retort.

He turned to look at Castiel. The shuttle was small and cramped, seating only two - it had been a recent addition to the Impala, so it wasn't as painstakingly and lovingly maintained as the rest of the ship. Dean fought back a nauseating wave of claustrophobia. He missed the familiar sloping walls of the Impala. She might have been a flying tin can, same as the shuttle, but she was his flying tin can.

But she was also too recognizable, and after Dean's run-in with Michael and Crowley, there was most definitely a bulletin out on the cortex about her. Which meant that any approach to Persephone had to be done in this creaking bucket of bolts - with a crew of two. A very _select_ crew of two.

"There is still time to turn around," Cas said, looking at him with concern. "Again, I remind you that this is not your fight."

Dean shrugged. "Things like this aren't anybody's fight," he said. "But they gotta be fought anyway, and I might just be enough of an idiot to do it. 'Sides," he shrugged, "we voted, didn't we?"

"_I find myself struggling to find a place to begin this story," Cas had said, staring blankly ahead. His eyes were fixed on the far wall of the mess, mind obviously scrambling to retreat someplace safer, more familiar. "There is just -"_

_Dean nudged him gently with his shoulder, bringing him back into the moment. Cas blinked, focusing on Dean's face. His eyes were huge and sorrowful, reluctant to expose himself, but accepting of the inevitability of this. Dean nudged him again, more a gesture of comfort than of prompting this time. _

_Cas straightened his shoulders, turning back to the room. This time, instead of staring at the wall, he looked each member of the crew of the Impala in the face, meaningful and lengthy. Sam, Bobby, Meg, Charlie, and Bela each returned his gaze with one of curiosity and intent._

"_Are you gonna make eyes at us all day, Tablet-Boy, or are you gonna start story-time?" Meg drawled. _

_Dean scowled at her, but Cas actually huffed a small laugh at that. "Very well," he said. "I suppose I should begin at the beginning._

"_I do not remember a time when I was not with the Operatives. We leave our families very young. I remember that my father had a beard, that my mother wore a blue dress... that is all. Operatives are raised in a covert facility on the Core, given extensive access to a carefully cultivated selection of literature, educated in a variety of fighting styles, and expected to maintain an empirically distant sense of mental equilibrium at all times. These are qualities that are etched into us, with steel and force. Any divergence from the dictated path is met with terminal discipline."_

"_By 'terminal' you mean..." Bela began._

_Cas nodded. "By 'terminal,' I mean 'terminal'. But instances of such disobedience are few and far between. On the whole, those raised to the life embrace it fully. We have one goal in living, and that is to provide for the balance and harmony of the Alliance... by any means necessary." He shrugged, a robotic motion, nonchalant without actually being nonchalant. "What could be a more worthy ambition than that?"_

_Bobby snorted. "Sounds like some Big Brother mumbo-jumbo to me."_

"_And you would have been terminated for even uttering those words," Cas said sharply, coming as close to snapping as Dean had ever heard. "Dissent is not tolerated."_

"_But you... dissented." Sam's voice was gentle, and Cas's glare softened imperceptibly as he turned to look at the younger man. "And you're still alive."_

"_I... had my eyes opened," Cas said. "I was not, perhaps, open-minded enough to understand the hypocrisy in the Operative's actions on my own. I had to have them illuminated for me. My... I suppose you could call her my sister. Her name was Anna. She... was on assignment. The Outer Rim, for over a year. When she returned, she was... different." His gaze returned to the far wall as he lost himself in memory. Dean did not try to shake him loose this time. "She had been exposed to - to -"_

_He shrugged again, hands open, grasping for a word that escaped him. "To people," Charlie supplied gently. He nodded at her, smiling faintly. _

"_Yes. She had seen how our actions only served to oppress them, to bend them into something the Alliance wanted them to be - something that damaged and warped them. Anna returned with a head full of thoughts of Free Will. For unfathomable reasons, she decided to impart them to me._

"_I nearly reported her. I wanted to. Every fiber of my upbringing told me that was the correct course of action. But - she was my sister. I allowed her to carry on with her chaotic thoughts and ideas - I believed she would keep them to herself."_

"_I'm guessing she didn't," Dean said. _

_The smile on Cas's lips grew sad. "No. She reached out to others across the galaxy, searching for those who would seek to bring down the Operatives as she did. It was slow progress, but it was progress nonetheless. She began to build a network of contacts, craft a chain of destruction that would detonate and bring down the Operatives with her. I was blinded by my undue affection for her - I did not realize that I myself had become a part of that chain until it was too late._

"_Anna had learned of the existence of the Angel Tablet - that catalog of the Operatives and their misdeeds. She had put together a plan to retrieve it, to broadcast the information, to show all how their lives were not their own. But we -" he broke off, swallowing hard. "We were betrayed. And Anna was taken. And I don't know what they -"_

_Words cut off abruptly - his jaw clenched. Dean laid a comforting hand on his shoulder. "With Anna gone," Cas finally continued, "it is my duty to finish what she started. She was strong enough, brave enough to see what I could not. I must carry on for her. Her plan and her network of contacts is still in place - in her name, I must expose the Operatives for what they truly are._

"_We call ourselves Angels, did you know that?" Cas's lip curled in a disdainful snarl. "The arrogance. Angels with their Angel Tablet. Controlling the universe 'for good'. But we are just men and women, with all the failings and weaknesses of humanity. We are no more capable of controlling the will of others as any of you."_

_He stuck his hands in the pockets of his jacket, a curiously Sam-like gesture that Dean figured he'd picked up sometime in the last few days. Something inside his chest warmed at the thought. It was evidently a signal of closure - his story was done, and he needed a few moments to gather himself back together. Dean guessed that was the first time he'd ever opened up like that to anyone else since Anna - and here he was, baring his soul to a room of six other people._

"_So what do you say?" Dean said, stepping forward beside Cas. "We got the Angel Tablet - we got Cas - we got a chance to tell the Alliance to stick it where the sun don't shine. But I ain't gonna speak for you and get you involved in a world of hurt you didn't sign up for. This don't sound like your particular cup of tea, no hard feelings at all - Lawrence'll keep you resting comfortable 'til we can circle back and pick you up, or you can get a ride off-planet with another crew." He looked around the room at each and every grim face. "Well?"_

As a child growing up on the outer planets, Dean had always thought that the Core planets were shiny and sparkly through-and-through. It wasn't until the jobs he and his dad had started working had taken them closer to the inner planets that he'd realized that while Core society put up a good front, it tended to be just as dingy and dusty as Lawrence. Winding through the back streets with Cas was a friendly reminder of this fact. High above soared the towering buildings, white and glass shining in one of the two local suns. But here on the ground, Dean dodged panhandlers and pickpockets, tried to avoid treading in things that were too unrecognizable, and had his nose assaulted by all manner of smells.

The bar they'd ended up at wasn't much better. Dean squinted at an unidentifiable smudge on the rim of his glass and tried to surreptitiously wipe it off. Being spotted at glass-maintenance and offending the bartender wouldn't help with the whole low-profile thing Cas was going for, but there was no way Dean was going to catch himself some tetanus or something because Gorilla-Arms the Bartender couldn't figure out how soap and water worked.

"I've sent the message," Cas said, appearing at Dean's side in that unsettlingly silent way of his.

"So now what?" Dean asked.

"We wait," Cas said. "_What_ is on your glass -"

Dean hushed him as quickly as he could, signaling for the bartender to bring another dubiously clean glass of the bottom-shelf boot polish he was calling whiskey. "Sip it," he said. "Slowly. This shit'll eat away at your insides if you let it. Bet it'd knock even _you_ under the table if you let it."

Cas nodded, slightly wide-eyed, and he raised the glass to his lips. Dean couldn't miss the expression of revulsion that crossed his face as the liquid touched his tongue, and he buried his laugh in his own glass. "That is not pleasant," Cas observed, setting the glass down on the bar.

"Ain't meant to be enjoyed," Dean said. "'S a punishment. This is the stuff you drink when you done something wrong and want to forget all about it."

"Punishment, you said?" To Dean's astonishment, Cas lifted the glass and took another, longer sip.

"You're risking your life to save the universe right now," Dean said. "What do you have to be punished for?"

"The list is a long one," Cas said serenely. "But your brother's predicament might come close to the top."

"Sammy -"

"Was meant to be an Operative," Cas said. "He exhibits all the traits - exceptional strength and intelligence, reflexes and hand-eye coordination far beyond the norm. He was able to land a punch on Michael, which is something even I struggle with. He has what it takes to be one of the most powerful Operatives in existence. You know it and I know it, and I believe even Sam knows it."

Dean had gone silent during this little speech, staring down into the scummy surface of his drink. "He does," he said quietly.

"So why wasn't he taken?" Cas asked, cocking his head. "He should have started training with the Operatives when he was six months old? What happened?"

_Fuck off! _ The words clawed at the inside of Dean's throat, but he swallowed them back. He was past that with Cas at this point - in fact, one glance at the man's gentle, inquisitive blue eyes was enough to loosen the hinges on his mouth.

He heaved a massive sigh. "There was a fire," Dean said. "I was... four. That night, I woke up and I saw my mom facing off with some man across Sammy's crib. He wanted to take Sam for somethin'. Didn't say what, but Mom wasn't on-board. She got between him and Sammy and he... well, he killed her." He shrugged. "Started a fire while he was at it. By that time, Dad was raising nine kinds of hell, and the mystery guy just kinda disappeared. After that, we weren't in one place for much of any time at all. if the Operatives still wanted Sammy, they might just have had a bitch of a time trying to find him."

"I am sorry, Dean."

"It's all in the past," Dean said, tone too bright to be real.

"I am realizing that is a thing that people say when they mean the exact opposite," Cas said. "Like when you say you are 'fine'. You are rarely 'fine'. Why don't you just say what you are truly thinking?"

_It would be easy to reach out and touch him right now,_ Dean thought hazily to himself. _ It would be so easy to grab his arm and haul him in and kiss him until we both forget our own names..._

"'S not safe," Dean said. "It just ain't what folk do."

Cas studied his face for a long moment, then nodded, apparently satisfied (or at least not inclined to press further). The two of them lapsed into silence for a few long minutes, drowning their thoughts in their disgusting drinks, keeping wary eyes on the other patrons of the bar, people who swirled and eddied around them, shouting greetings and insults at one another, challenging them to games of checkers or matches at the dart board or pistols at dawn. It was strange to be surrounded by so much life and energy and be so consciously separate from it. Dean found himself missing the Impala and his crew something fierce.

"Shit."

It was the first time he'd heard Cas curse - really curse, not just in a show for Crowley and his boys. Dean shot him a quizzical look - the man was staring at the door, where a large dark-skinned man stood, smiling coldly and directly at Castiel. There was something in the way he stood that told Dean immediately what he was.

"Operative?" Dean muttered.

Cas nodded imperceptibly. "We have to go."

"I'll follow your lead."

Cas _threw_ himself at his neighbor, a scarred and hairy man with a massive stomach, pitching the larger man sideways into his own neighbor. The scarred man let out a startled yell, whirling to throw a punch at Cas - but Cas was no longer there. Instead, his flailing fist hit a passing server, who retaliated with the enthusiasm of someone who had been just spoiling for a fight all evening.

The bar fight that broke out was immediate and brutal. Dean had only a moment to gape before Cas was grabbing at his bicep and hauling him through the swirling melee towards the rear exit. Even with Cas guiding him, Dean's footing was less than sure, and he wound up catching a fist in the side at least twice.

He was gasping by the time they burst into the back alley, but there was no time to catch his breath. Cas was jogging towards the main street, and Dean had to scramble to catch up. "Cas -" he said, "- what about your contact -"

"Castiel."

The Operative from inside the bar seemed to fill the entirety of the alley mouth, though he couldn't have been more than six feet tall. There was something about his presence that set fire to the fight-or-flight portions of Dean's brain - something deathly intimidating.

Cas seemed to have slipped back into his impassive Operative mask, staring down the other man gravely. "Uriel," he grated.

Uriel smiled, teeth flashing white in the fading sunlight. "I am pleased to see you, brother," he said. "I have been looking for you for too long. Michael will be glad to know that you are safe."

"It is not _my_ safety that concerns Michael," Cas retorted.

Uriel laughed coldly. "That's as may be," he said. "But your whereabouts have been the talk of the garrison for weeks now." His eyes flicked briefly to Dean, who felt as though someone was shining a spotlight into every nasty little crevice of his soul. "This must be the renowned Captain Winchester. Your taste, Castiel, is questionable as ever."

"You listen up, you smug ass-monkey -" Dean started, but Cas caught his arm and squeezed, hard enough to leave a bruise.

"It talks, too," Uriel said mockingly. "Charming. Castiel. If you come with me now, I promise that I will let your Captain Winchester live."

"Didn't say anything about not torturing me, though," Dean muttered.

"I will let him live _eventually_," Uriel said, glaring at Dean. "The more... difficult option will be even less pleasant, I can assure you."

Cas was still holding tight to Dean's arm, his touch now reassuring rather than prohibitive. "Cas..." Dean whispered. "Don't..."

But he never had a chance to tell Cas what not to do, as Uriel was blasted sideways by some unseen force. "What the gorram hell was that?" Dean yelped.

Another figure appeared in the alley mouth - a slight young man wearing a hooded jacket and carrying some immense modified stun weapon. He blinked at the two of them from exhausted, dark-circled eyes, his black hair flopping into his face. "One of you Castiel?" he asked.

"Kevin Tran?" Cas asked, stepping forward. "You got my message -"

"You write like a thesaurus, you know that?" Kevin said.

Cas blinked. "I was not aware that -"

"Dean Winchester, nice to meet ya," Dean said, doing his best to salvage the introduction. He stuck out his hand to shake - but Kevin held up the gigantic stun-gun with both of his own.

"Hands kinda full," Kevin said, "but I'm not much of a shaker anyway. Come on, we've done the civilized greeting - we've gotta make tracks before more of these assholes come sniffing around for us."

Neither Cas nor Dean missed the kick he leveled at Uriel as he passed.

**xXx**

"A campus library? Seriously, man?"

"What?" Kevin asked defiantly. "You got a problem with books?"

"Just when they're all in one place," Dean muttered.

The three of them were standing in the center of a bustling university campus. Even after the sun had gone down students were dashing from building to building in a steady stream around the trio. Kevin started for the double doors of the library without offering Dean any sort of response.

He was a strange kid, Dean decided as he followed, all cactus-prickles and condensed anger. He'd tasered Uriel with every sign of pleasure, and he obviously knew how to use the very complicated weapon he now had stashed in his knapsack. But he looked like he'd be more at home in a lecture hall than trading blows with Operatives in dark alleys on the shitty side of Persephone - so what the hell was he doing headlining Cas's contact list?

No one gave Kevin a second glance as he maneuvered through the recesses of the library, making for a camouflaged staircase behind several rows of heavy oaken bookcases. "It's genius," Cas murmured behind Dean.

"Genius? Mr. University has his top-secret lair right on top of one of the busiest areas on the planet!"

"And yet no one will pay him the slightest bit of attention around here," Cas replied. "Kevin fits right in among the students in the area. The odds of someone noticing his comings and goings are next to nonexistent."

"Huh." Dean mulled this over for a long moment. Cas had a point. "How'd you come up with that idea?"

"Used to be at school over on Helios," Kevin said shortly. "Advanced Placement. I basically lived in the library after - I spent a lot of time in the library. Nobody paid me any mind. Here we are -"

He turned off the dark staircase into a narrow corridor. It was dusty here - Dean sneezed three times in a row without stopping. By the time he blinked his watering eyes back open, Kevin was yanking on a cord connected to a ceiling panel. The panel slid aside, and Kevin jumped up to pull down a rickety ladder, which he proceeded to clamber up without a word of explanation.

There was a set of small rooms at the top of the ladder - an open living room area with a table, several chairs, and a couch, and two rooms - Dean supposed they'd be called bedrooms if only because they had cots set up in them - that were roughly the size of broom cupboards. "Nice place," Dean deadpanned.

"Where's the damn Tablet?" Kevin asked.

"Jeez. Manners never killed anyone," Dean muttered, but Cas was already stepping forward.

"I have it," he said. "It will... take a moment for me to retrieve it for you. Do you mind if I retreat to one of the rooms in order to do so?"

"Help yourself," Kevin said. The 'weirdo' was heavily implied - even more so when Castiel unsheathed a nasty-looking knife before disappearing into one of the bedrooms. His departure left Kevin and Dean staring awkwardly at one another across the table.

"Uh," Dean began helplessly, staring around the barren room for any topic of conversation. His eyes alighted on a faded photograph pinned to the wall near Kevin's seat at the table. "Is, uh, that your mom?"

The photograph was old, featuring a young, smiling boy that must have been Kevin sitting on the lap of an equally happy woman. The same joyous light burned out of both of their eyes. "Yeah," Kevin said flatly. He didn't look at the picture.

"She looks nice."

"She was."

Again, there was that unpleasant sensation of having stumbled into a conversational blind drop, splashing through the disguised and brutal pain that ran so close to the surface of Kevin's soul. "She gone?" Dean asked.

"Yeah."

"Operatives?"

There was a bitten-off cry from the other room, and Dean tried hard not to think about what Cas was doing to himself to retrieve the Angel Tablet. Kevin's eyes flickered, stony exterior shattering for just one moment. In that instant, Dean found himself looking at a young man who very much did not want to be in the situation he was in - a young man who was sad and lonely and the moment of vulnerability passed in a microsecond, and then Kevin was sliding into his chair and flipping open two computer monitors. "I'm gonna get set up," he said. "Make yourself comfortable, or whatever. I don't really care."

"Moment over," Dean muttered, staring at the back of Kevin's head. "Copy that."

**xXx**

"He's too young to be this strung-out," Dean muttered to Cas just loud enough for the other man to hear. "Hell, he can't be more'n what? Eighteen?"

"He is focused. Driven." Cas was pale after his retrieval of the Angel Tablet. There had been no bloodstains on his hands when he'd returned to the living area, but knowing that they had been there had been more than unsettling enough for Dean.

"He's _wrecked_, man. I mean, c'mon. Look at him." Dean gestured helplessly at the kitchen table where Kevin was typing nonstop with one hand and leafing through a dusty old _paper_ book with the other, eyes darting from page to screen incessantly. "It's like he's possessed. Sammy goes _nuts_ whenever he has the chance to do something dorky and research-y, but even he ain't ever this bad." He watched as Kevin groped blindly for the sketchy-as-all-hell energy drink he seemed to have bought in bulk and drained it in one gulp. Dean winced. Those things looked like chemical waste and tasted even worse.

"He is doing what is necessary," Cas said, fixing Dean with those confused blue eyes. "No one is forcing him. He has chosen to be here."

"Chosen out of how many options?" Dean shot back. "You can't take a machete to the contents of a man's life and then say 'the world is your oyster'. It just ain't so. Thought you of all people would understand that." When Cas just continued to stare at him blankly, Dean ran a hand over his face, sighing. "If someone said to you, 'you can fight or you can curl up and die,' you'll choose 'fight' each and every time. Human beings - we've got faulty wiring like that, you know?"

"I suppose."

"Where free will comes in," Dean said, "is where you get to pick what you're fighting _for_. Or who. The Operatives... well, they made that decision for Kevin a long time ago. Now he's going on the only way he can... 'cuz he doesn't have much in the way of options." He studied Cas carefully, trying in vain to read the other man's expression. "Does that make sense?"

"...choose what you're fighting for," Cas echoed.

"Yeah. More or less."

"Hm." Cas's eyebrows furrowed. "What do you fight for?"

"Me?" A hot flush rose up Dean's neck, and he quickly looked away. "Oh, you know. A little of everything. Pie. Whiskey. Sex. The Impala." He shrugged. "Bobby. Sammy. My crew." He dared a glance back at Cas and found - just as he'd feared - that the man was staring _through_ him, if that was even possible. "What, uh -" he cleared his throat, fighting back that damn insidious blush. "What about you?"

"Would you guys keep it down?"

Kevin was glaring at them, irritation shining through the weariness in his eyes. "I know you're having a moment, or whatever, but seriously? I'm trying to work on _your_ stupid Angel Tablet over here, and you're _distracting_ me."

"Jesus, kid, don't -" Dean began.

Cas cut him off. "Our apologies, Kevin," he said gravely, bowing his head. "We will continue our conversation elsewhere."

"We, uh -" Dean absolutely _didn_'_t_ squeak. "We will?"

"Yes," Cas said. He rose, all purpose and grace. "Please follow me, Captain." And the Operative took off at a purposeful stride for the shuttered windows, pulling them open and stepping onto the ledge outside.

Kevin watched this exchange with exhaustion-dulled confusion, glancing quizzically at Dean. He managed a shrug and nothing more, before following Cas out onto the roof.

The library was modeled in the classic style, with honest-to-god shingles and even the occasional stone gargoyle. The ledge beneath the window was a more-than-substantial walkway, resembling a balcony more than anything else. Castiel was already several yards down, and Dean had to walk quickly to catch up, steadfastly refusing to glance down. When Cas disappeared around the corner of the tower, Dean had to close his eyes before edging around it himself, convinced he was going to slip and fall to his death.

Instead, the walkway opened up onto a flat, flagstone-paved roof, complete with a short, decorative fence along the edge. Castiel was already settling down onto the flagstones, leaning against the back wall and stretching his long legs out in front of him. Clambering over the fence, Dean copied him.

"Why," he finally said, "are we risking our lives to climb all over a gorram building?"

"We would be risking our lives to stay," Cas replied. "If we hadn't left, I am sure that Kevin would have killed us."

Dean couldn't help but chuckle at that. "Man," he said, "if you aren't careful, you're gonna grow a sense of humor. What'll the other Operatives say?"

The other man just shrugged, a small gesture that matched the tiny smile curving his mouth. The movement brought his shoulder imperceptibly closer to Dean's, which Dean would ordinarily not have noticed. But he seemed to be irrevocably attuned to Cas, and everything from the rasp of his clothes on the stonework to the fractional increase in body heat against Dean's own skin set off alarm bells in Dean's skull. _You idiot,_ Dean thought to himself, _you really got yourself in deep, didn't you?_

"I had nothing," Cas said, unprompted.

Dean blinked at him stupidly. "Huh?"

"Nothing. To fight for. I had my orders - I had what had been ingrained in me since I was a child. I had routine and obedience." He shook his head. "I had nothing."

"Cas..." Dean said, for lack of anything else.

"Even when I stole the Angel Tablet, I suspect that I was still working under programmed instructions. To build a better society. My idea of a 'better society' was simply different than that which my superiors saw. Different... yet still vague, abstract. And then - I met you, Dean Winchester."

His eyes found Dean's in the dim light of the Persephone night - luminous and bright, and Dean was suddenly conscious of every breath he drew into his lungs. "You are not abstract," Cas told him. "You are not vague. You are coarse and vulgar and you curse too much and apologize too little."

"Thank you," Dean deadpanned.

"You also care. Deeply. About many, many things. You love, and you cherish. And you trust me, of all people - which I still do not fully fathom, but I find myself far too willing to overlook any inconsistencies there." He cocked his head. "The Operatives would have me think you are to be destroyed. But they are wrong. You are not the burnt and broken shell of a man they believe you to be."

"Cas -"

"So I will fight for you. And for the people you love, but mostly for you. That is my choice." He nudged Dean's shoulder with his own - on purpose this time. "Is that alright with you?"

How the hell was a person supposed to respond to a declaration like that? For a very long moment, Dean could do nothing more than stare blankly at the other man as his brain ran in circles, attempting to grind some sort of sense out of the words.

_Is that alright with you?_

_I will fight for you._

_Is that alright with you?_

His hand found the collar of Cas's jacket and he was hauling the Operative towards him before his upstairs-brain had a chance to catch up with his downstairs-brain. Cas gave a startled grunt and started to struggle - but stopped once he seemed to realize what was going on (which Dean was immensely grateful of - he didn't think he could take Castiel in a fight).

Off-balance, Cas nearly toppled over Dean's legs, but caught himself, one hand splayed on the wall on the far side of Dean's head. They sat for a long, heart-rending moment, faces centimeters away from one another, an obvious echo of their soul-gazing that night on Lawrence. _ Don't push it,_ Dean willed himself, even though every nerve in his body was _screaming_ to launch him at Cas, to push him to the ground and crush his lips with his own. _Let him make the final move -_

_- but if he can't -_

Dean shouldn't have worried.

All of a moment he was slammed back against the wall, six feet of lean-muscled Operative attached to him at the lips. It wasn't sexy or romantic - above all else, it was gorram _forceful, blasting_ the breath out of Dean's lungs with a muffled _oomph_. Dean grabbed hold of Cas's shoulders, easing the man back slightly, lessening the bruising onslaught enough to turn the press of their mouths into something -

something

_fuck_

He hadn't intended to moan, soft and low in his throat, but it had been so long - so damn long since he'd done this. The soft noise he heard in response, coupled with Cas's hands clutching against the fabric of his jacket set shivers racing across his skin, made the air in his lungs feel like delicious fire. Dean gripped the other man, bringing him closer, closer, so much closer - manhandling him into his lap, shifting him so that Cas essentially knelt with a leg on either side of Dean's hips.

Dean realized, very distantly, that he would need to breathe soon, but the concept of pulling away was just too painful. Cas had to be the one to cave in to the very human need to oxygen, moving back a scarce centimeter. Dean could feel his chest heaving against his own as he stared into his eyes, blue eyes wide and electric and fixed on green with a marveling urgency.

"Are we -" Dean managed, before words kind of failed him. "Uh -"

Cas politely suggested that he shut up by pressing him back against the wall again, mouth hot and insistent on Dean's.

_Wu De Ma_ it felt good, the long, hot lines of Cas's body pressed up against his. With a growl, Dean slipped his hands up the back of the loose blue shirt the man always wore, pushing the fabric upwards. Cas, bless the guy, was a smart cookie, and got the memo without much more prompting. He shrugged the shirt over his head in a decisive gesture, whipping the garment at least ten feet. It snagged on the small fence and nearly escaped fluttering away down to the surface of Persephone. But hell, Dean wasn't paying attention to poetic nonsense like that - not when there were yards of exposed, tanned Cas-skin suddenly available to run his hands over.

Cas stared down at him, backlit by the stars. Looking up at him - dark hair sticking up at odd angles, cheeks flushed, the flat planes of his chest heaving under Dean's hands - he had the sudden sensation of falling. "Christ," he muttered, dipping his head to taste Cas's skin to keep from dying of a unique kind of starvation.

Questing lips found Cas's nipple, and his teeth scraped across the sensitive skin there. He wasn't prepared for the strangled moan that slipped from Cas's lips at the contact - even less so for the way the other man ground down into his lap, sending sparks of sensation up his spine and effectively shutting down his brain.

It was only when his hands ran across the fresh bandage on Cas's side that he came back to himself. Fingertips brushed across the edges of the plaster - Dean sat back, tearing his lips away from Cas's collarbone. He tried his best to ignore the extremely disappointed noises Cas was making, instead holding the man by the shoulders and keeping him at arms length.

"You - we can't do this."

"Yes we can," Cas said, lunging back for Dean. Dean, weak-willed man that he was, allowed himself to be soundly kissed and groped for a solid minute before worming his way back out of the man's grasp.

"Yes, we - not now - not like -"

"Dean." Cas's voice was grave and far too composed for someone whose trousers were tenting as impressively as his. "We might die tomorrow. I might get stabbed by Michael or some other Operative and Crowley might escape Lawrence and shoot the Impala out of the sky. So if you're trying to put this off due to some misguided sense of chivalry -"

"You giving me the last-night-on-Earth speech, Cas?" Dean interrupted, cocking an eyebrow. Cas just cocked his head, all innocence and naiveté and bullshit. Dean couldn't help but laugh, feeling far too joyous for someone in his dire situation. "That's my line, y'know," he said. "I invented that line."

"I hardly think -"

"I _perfected_ that line," Dean amended. "You can't just pull that one on me."

"Why?" Cas asked. "Is it working?"

And the sonuvabitch _writhed_, body rippling sinuously against Dean's in all the right places. Dean's eyes actually rolled back in his head and he had to start doing rapid-fire calculations to keep from coming in his pants - which hadn't happened since he was fourteen and getting to third base with Rhonda Hurley behind Bobby's old junkyard.

"_Go shi_," Dean _whimpered_, catching hold of Cas's hips - whether to urge him to _do that again_ or to stop him before Dean made a mess. "Cas - I didn't -" Cas's lips were doing very distracting things against his neck, and Dean could swear that the lights of the city _blurred_ before his eyes as the sensation sparked in his brain. "I didn't mean we can't at all - _Christ_ - I meant - there's a bed downstairs - and - _gorrammit ah ah_ - helluvalot more comfortable than -"

"I like the way you think, Captain," Cas said, all serene eyes and sex-ruffled hair. He hauled himself off Dean's lap and extended a hand for Dean to follow suit.

Once Dean was on his feet, he took in Castiel and their surroundings for a long moment, a curious sadness swamping him, filling him up alongside the overwhelming ecstatic feeling that was buzzing from his scalp to his toes.

"Might die tomorrow, huh?"

"Perhaps," Cas replied. "But I will certainly die right now if we don't get to that bed."


	8. Chapter 8

People shouldn't be able to concentrate as well as Kevin appeared to be concentrating.

Not that Dean was necessarily complaining. He was having a hard enough time formulating coherent sentences, what with the ghosts of Cas's lips against his neck and the other man's fingers burning into his skin. Trying to explain the situation away to a most likely exasperated teenager would have strained his already diminished wits to the breaking point.

Still. When a pair of six-foot-plus men - one half-naked - stumbled past you, groping one another and attached at the lips, a person tended to take notice. The fact that Kevin's eyes remained glued to the monitor, headphones fixed firmly in his ears, was a bit worrying.

Dean made a mental note to care about it in an hour or so.

His moan of "_Jesus_, Cas -" was swallowed in the other man's mouth, and Dean gave himself over to being bodily steered towards one of the two closet-sized bedrooms. The world seemed to have turned hazy sometime in the last five minutes - he barely even noticed when the bedroom door slammed loudly shut and he was pressed up against the wall, Cas one long line of hard heat against him.

For a moment, Dean blessed Operative training and its insistence on attention to detail, because Cas seemed to be picking up on every single pleased little sound escaping from Dean's lips and doing whatever he could to make sure that Dean made that exact sound again. Only louder. And typically followed by Cas's name in a breathy, highly embarrassing voice.

Around the time Dean realized his knees were actually growing weak (like some gorram chick), he decided that this whole thing was becoming way too one-sided - and also that it still involved 100% too many clothes. Never a man to beat about the sexual bush (har), Dean reached for the fastenings on Cas's trousers. The damn things were practically _welded_ on with some sort of unfathomable hi-tech mechanism (it was probably buttons, but Dean didn't have time for buttons). Quickly growing frustrated, Dean growled and gave the fabric a yank, pulling so hard he heard the buttons rip off. The fact that he'd actually torn a person's clothing off gave him cause for pause - he pulled back just a few centimeters, the back of his head banging against the wall, eyes meeting Cas's for a slightly shocked moment.

_Are we gonna do this?_

The corner of Castiel's mouth quirked upwards in what, for him, amounted to a beaming grin. "You tore my clothes," he rumbled.

"Yes. I did, yes," Dean rambled like the sex-crazed idiot he was.

"That was very rude of you," Cas said, trailing his fingers up Dean's chest, then back down. It took Dean a moment to register that Cas was actually undoing the buttons on the front of his shirt, fingers moving so lightly and so deftly that the first clue he had was the sensation of cool air on his skin.

"You know me," Dean managed. His arms seemed to have gone numb and heavy, hanging against his side like two useless... things (his brain was too fogged-up to function in metaphors). "Rude. Me."

"Rude," Cas repeated, bringing his hands to Dean's shoulders and pushing the shirt onto the floor. He ducked his head, and the sensation of his breath against Dean's skin was nearly enough to have Dean's eyes rolling back in his head.

_Enough_, Dean thought, a fierce grin stretching his lips. He made his move with the other man was distracted with doing demonic things to Dean's nipple. One leg snaked out between Cas's, hooking around his ankle. He reached out and _shoved_, hard enough so that Cas had no choice but to fall backwards, an awesome, shocked look on his face. Dean would have laughed, but the other man's reflexes were too fast to let Dean have this victory completely. On his way towards the mattress, Cas reached out and snagged Dean by the bicep, yanking him down on top of him.

They landed with an _oomph_ that was equal parts pained and horny, Dean getting a flying elbow to the ribs for his deception. "Ah!" he yelped, before finding himself flipped onto his back by arms that were deceptive in their strength.

Cas's eyes burned down into his, amused and intense and blue blue blue. "I told you," Cas said. "I'm very cautious in my selection of sparring partners."

In the struggle, the Operative's mutilated pants had slipped down his thighs, and Dean could see the black boxer-briefs he wore underneath. "Yeah?" Dean said, careful to maintain eye contact as he slipped his hands down Cas's torso and towards his goal. "Seems I made the cut."

His questing fingers found what they were looking for, wrapping around Cas's cotton-clothed dick tightly. Cas let out his breath in a huff and dropped his head to Dean's shoulder. "It seems you did," he agreed, apparently struggling to get the words out.

And if that wasn't triumph, Dean didn't know what was.

But it wasn't enough, and that seemed to be a point on which he and Cas agreed completely. Dean was still wearing his pants, for one thing, and Cas's underwear (while wet and growing deliciously wetter) was hurting more than it was helping. Dean tugged at the band of Cas's underwear. "Off," he commanded. He half-expected Cas's eyes to narrow, for him to shoot back some retort, to push back against Dean like he'd done so far this evening - but apparently even an Operative's patience had limits, because Cas was scrambling off him, tugging off his trousers and underwear, and licking his lips as he watched Dean do the same.

"Come here," Cas ordered, voice rough and low, and Dean crawled back into his arms, now pushing Cas back down onto the bed, relishing the sensation of warm skin on warm skin. Cas's temperature seemed to run cooler than Dean's. Dean wondered hazily if that was because of what he was, but with long, strong fingers tugging his hair and pulling his mouth down to Cas's, he couldn't find it in him to ponder that for long.

There was an Earth-That-Was phrase that Dean had heard bandied around some of his stupider circles of friends - "out of this world". 'Course, this came from a time when most things were - when actually going off-planet was something approaching an idiot's pipe dream. From what Dean could gather, the phrase basically meant that something was above and beyond - that something was too incredible to be believed.

Kissing Cas was out of this world. The slick side of lips and tongues and the way Cas nipped at the borders of Dean's mouth - if Dean had to choose a way to die, this might be the best way to go.

That is, until Cas _moved_ underneath him, his hips bucking up against Dean. Their cocks slid together, delicious friction forcing a delirious moan out of Dean's throat. He had to stop, to pull back, to squeeze his eyes closed and get a handle on himself. There were no two ways about it - this was not going to last as long as he'd like, but he'd be damned if he came from just the slightest hint of a hump.

"Come on, Dean."

Cas's voice pierced through him, forcing Dean to open his eyes. The other man was gazing up at him, cheeks flushed, his eyes more alive and sparkling and _human_ than Dean had ever seen them. And there - there was a hint of sadness in all that joy as well.

What was it Cas had said?

_We might die tomorrow_.

The thought was enough to spur Dean to action. Bracing himself on one elbow, he reached down between them and wrapped the two of them in one hand, reveling in the way that Cas gnawed at his lip and scrabbled at his back, obviously fighting the same overwhelming urge to let go that Dean had been moments before. He gave an experimental pump, spreading pre-cum over both of their cocks.

It felt like the best thing in the world. Dean stopped himself from whimpering by leaning down to capture Cas's mouth with his own even as he set a punishing pace with his hand and with his hips, pistoning and pumping with everything he had. To his utter delight, Cas matched him easily, wrapping his legs around the backs of Dean's thighs and bringing his own hips up every time Dean brought his down.

The sensation of slick skin on slick skin, the soft sounds Dean did his best to swallow (because though Kevin was lost in his own world, there was no sense in pushing the boundaries) were like napalm to Dean's self control. All too soon he felt that familiar heat coiling in the base of his gut. He let out a groan.

"Cas - I can't - I'm gonna -"

"I know," Cas panted, holding on to Dean's shoulders tighter, if that were even possible. "Me too." And he leaned up to capture Dean's mouth in the most downright _filthy_ kiss Dean had ever experienced, his tongue sliding over Dean's teeth and making a good push for Dean's tonsils.

_Show's over folks._

Dean tore his mouth away from Cas's, biting down on the other man's shoulder as he came, harder and more intensely than any orgasm in recent memory (although the fireworks behind his eyes may have done a number on his recall capabilities). Cas followed close behind him, moaning far too loud to be ignored by even Kevin as his cock pulsed in Dean's hand, spreading more of the warm, sticky mess across Dean's fingers.

Dean's supporting arm gave out and he collapsed next to Cas, absentmindedly wiping his hand on the inside of Cas's ruined trousers. He turned to find Cas watching him, an amused smile on his lips.

"I'm going to have to wear those tomorrow, you know," Cas mumbled, slinging an arm around Dean's waist.

"Yeah?" Dean said, feeling a familiar post-orgasm sleepiness tugging at the corners of his consciousness. "That's a damn pity."

**xXx**

Something was beeping incessantly in the darkness near the floor.

"Dean."

"Mmph."

"Dean. That is your comm."

Dean buried his face in his arm, doing his best to burrow into the thin mattress. When the beeping continued, he felt Cas's arm around his waist slide away. Before he could protest the lack of contact, the other man placed both hands against Dean's back and pushed him bodily off the bed.

He hit the floor with a _thunk_. "Cas, what the hell -"

"Your comm. The beeping." Cas peered blearily over the edge of the bed down at him. His hair was sticking up in every conceivable direction, and he was wearing a frankly adorable peevish expression. "It is very annoying."

"Fine, fine." Dean groped through the darkness until he found his pants, pulling his comm out and fixing it to his ear. "Happy?"

His only response was a most-likely fake snore.

Burying a smile, Dean tugged his pants on and stepped out into the main living space. "Yeah?" he whispered into the comm.

Kevin was still hard at work at the table. You could row a kayak through the sunken dark circles under his eyes. He flicked his gaze over to Dean briefly in acknowledgment, but turned back to his work without saying anything.

"Dean?" Sam's voice filtered through the comm.

"What's up?"

"Got word from Ellen on Lawrence," Sam said. Dean made his way over to the window and stepped out onto the ledge he and Cas had traversed earlier in the evening. "She says Crowley's gone."

"He's what?"

"_Gone_, Dean. Ellen turned up at the sheriff's office this morning. Found an empty cell and Deputy Hendrickson knocked all kinds of unconscious. She says it looks like someone with a kind of intimidating skill-set maneuvered their way in and got Crowley out."

"Not his guys, then?"

"Crowley's more the hack-and-slash kind. This job was neat. Focused."

"_Wu De Ma_," Dean cursed, scrubbing a hand over his face.

"Sounds like Operatives," Sam observed.

"That it does." Dean paused a moment. "Hendrickson gonna be okay?" The lawman was touchy and grumpy at the best of times, and he and Dean had not always seen eye-to-eye - but at the heart of it all, he was a real standup guy. Better than me by a long shot, Dean thought wryly.

"Jess says he'll pull through just fine."

Dean grinned. "_Jess_, huh? You talkin' to Jess?"

"Shut up. I just thought you should know. 'Cuz if Crowley's free -"

"- he'll be making tracks for us, speedy as he can," Dean finished. "That's just shiny."

There was a moment of silence. Dean gazed out over the sparkling lights of Persephone, trying not to wish himself back in bed with Cas so fervently and failing. _If I'd known sex could be like that,_ he thought,_ I'd'a bedded an Operative a long, long time ago._

But it was more than that, Dean knew. It was more than Cas's Operative training. It was Cas. It was a guy who had stormed into Dean's life and shaken his priorities upside-down and spun his head. It was a guy with a guilt complex to rival Dean's own, someone who understood the weight of assumed responsibility. It was a guy who kinda just... got it.

So lost in his own gooey thoughts, it took Dean a moment to realize that Sam was talking. "Say that again, Sammy?"

"I asked how the progress was going on the tablet."

"Seems steady enough," Dean said. "This Kevin kid gives you a run for the money when it comes to focus. He's kinda scary, actually. Never thought I'd be terrified of a 140-pound teenager, but here we are." He shook his head, forgetting for a moment that Sam couldn't see it. "The Operatives destroyed this kid, Sammy. It's - it ain't good. He's smart - like, genius-level, reminds me of you a lot, actually. But he spends his time locked in a dusty old hideaway with noting but a photo of his mom for company."

There was silence from the other end of the line for a long moment. "Do you think he can crack it?"

"If anyone can, it's him."

"Do you -" Sam broke off, and Dean could picture his brother's jaw tightening around the words. "Do you think my name will be on it?"

There it was. The fact the two of them had been dancing around for days. Dean heaved a sigh, letting his head fall back against the hard brick wall. He would give damn near anything to be back in bed with Cas right now, to lose himself in heated kisses and blood-boiling sex, to avoid saying -

"Yeah. I do."

There was a huff of breath from Sam, and Dean was surprised to note that his brother sounded somewhat relieved when he spoke next. "Okay," Sam said.

"Sammy -"

"No, it's okay, Dean," Sam said. "It's just - good to know that I'm not crazy. I'm different, and it's not all in my head. It's okay."

"We'll work through this."

"Yeah," Sam said. "I know. We will."

"Hey. Loverboy."

That was Kevin, sticking his disheveled head out the window and staring across at Dean with that exhausted-eyed stare. "I got your Tablet unlocked. You better get in here."

Dean bid a hasty good-bye to Sam over the comm and scrambled back in the window. Cas was already hovering by Kevin's workstation, his broken trousers slung distracting low across his hips. He wasn't wearing a shirt. Dean recalled distractedly that the garment was most likely still out on the roof where it had been tossed, and he sent a quick prayer that it had blown away. He liked shirtless Cas.

"What do you got?" Dean asked, padding across the floor to stand beside Cas as Kevin slipped back into his chair.

"Everything," Kevin said, a note of pride sparking in his voice. "Person, place, thing - you want it, we got it. Look -" He scrolled through the indecipherable (to Dean) rows of figures until he reached something that apparently made perfect sense to him. Pulling one particular symbol up, he expanded it and expanded it - until Dean could read the name "MICHAEL" in broad letters, plain as day. Below the name was a list of ops, complete with dates, names, and locations. And at the bottom of the list -

"Born Adam Milligan on Sundown," Dean read. "Jesus, you weren't kidding."

"Cookie for the genius over here," Kevin drawled.

"Sam," Dean said, ignoring the jibe. "My brother. Sam Winchester. Is he -" He gestured, not quite willing to finish that sentence out loud. In his wordless silence, Cas slid over a step. His shoulder didn't quite touch Dean's, but Dean could feel the other man's body heat sinking through his skin and relaxing some of the tension in his muscles.

"One sec -" Kevin navigated the strange screen like it was nothing, zeroing in on a row of oblique symbols. "Uh - yeah, this is him - but -"

He didn't bring the symbol up. Instead, he stared at the one directly next to it, eyes flicking uncomfortably from the screen to Dean and back again. "What?" Dean snapped, the silence putting him on-edge.

"Well," Kevin said, "I think it's safe to say you're not gonna like this."

And he expanded the symbol next to Sam's.

"MARY CAMPBELL"

Dean's mouth went dry. "No," he rasped.

The list of ops below her name was nearly as long as the one under Michael's. His eyes jumped from word to word, not quite absorbing what he was seeing. Despite his shock, certain terms jumped out at him - phrases like "no survivors" and "thorough termination".

At the bottom of the list - a line. "Defected. Current whereabouts unknown."

Then, the final sentence. "Rediscovered - Lawrence. Married - husband John Winchester. Current alias - Mary Winchester. Two children - Dean and Samuel."

"Dean." Cas's voice was quiet, soothing, but Dean couldn't tear his eyes away from the screen. "Are you okay?"

"'M fine," he mumbled, the words a knee-jerk reaction to that question.

"Which means you're not," Cas said. "_Dean_. Look at me."

_This has gotta be a dream,_ Dean thought. _Like those nightmares about the night Mom died. I'm gonna wake up when I flail myself outta bed and hit the floor, and I'm gonna have a bruise on my shoulder, but this won't be real. And that seems like a helluva great deal._

He met Cas's eyes.

"Did you know about this?"

The question seemed to come from light-years away, but it hit Cas hard enough to have him swaying backwards, blue eyes widening. "What?" Cas asked.

"You knew about Sam," Dean said flatly. "Did you know about my mom, too?"

The quiet hurt seemed to blaze from Cas's eyes. "Of course not," he said. "I would never have lied to you about that."

"But lying to me about other things was pretty much standard operating procedure with you until yesterday," Dean snapped. "Why should I believe you?"

Cas just stared at him, mouth tight, jaw clenched. Their eye-lock lasted until Kevin, slouched between them, cleared his throat irritatedly.

"Look, I know this is all incredibly shocking for you," Kevin said dryly, "but I wanna put these bastards in the ground, and I can't do that if the two of you are just gonna stand around staring at each other. Okay?" It was Cas who looked away first, nodding sharply. "Good," Kevin continued. He pushed his chair back and stood, turning to face the pair of them, and leaned back against the table with his arms crossed. "We've got the intel," he said. "Now we just need to figure out what to do with it."

There was a beat of silence as Dean tried to drag his thoughts back into the present. "Distribute it," he finally managed. "As far and wide as we can."

"That's a great idea, hotshot," Kevin said, "but the Alliance controls the airwaves. Any feed I try is gonna get blocked and censored before the first name makes it out the gate. Unless you know someone with a direct line to the Cortex, that master-plan is humped."

"I know someone," Cas grated out. He had slipped more or less entirely back into robot-Operative mode, every shred of electric humanity that had sparked in his face during his time with Dean tamped down. Even his posture was different - more rigid, more square than it was before. Despite his shirtlessness, the man looked invulnerable. "A member of Anna's chain of contacts. He runs an entertainment company over on Ariel."

"And what makes you think he'll want to help us?" Dean couldn't help but snipe.

"Because he used to be an Operative," Cas said. "Like your mother, he defected, changed his identity, and went on the run. We only realized he was even alive when Anna stumbled upon him."

Dean looked at Kevin, who shrugged. "It's worth a shot," Dean acquiesced. "I'll let Sam know we're headed back to the Impala." He wandered back towards the bedroom, already firing up his comm.

"Great," Kevin called after him. "Just burn the bedsheets before you go."

**xXx**

"Mom?! Seriously, Dean?"

Dean gripped the controls so tight that his knuckles turned white. He kept his eyes fixed on the black nothingness outside the window. Meg had offered to set the Impala on autopilot and plot a course for Ariel, but Dean had waved the proposal aside - he needed to feel in charge of something right now, and he needed the familiar embrace of his ship.

"Yeah," Dean said. "Guess you inherited your freaky Operative Powers from somewhere, huh?"

"Stop digging at your brother, you idjit," Bobby said from the seat behind Sam's. He was leaning forward, forearms propped on his knees. "You ain't helping."

Dean and Cas had docked the shuttle back on the Impala twenty minutes ago and disembarked without saying a word to one another. Truth to tell, they hadn't spoken much since leaving Kevin's earlier in the night. Kevin himself hadn't looked too teary to see them go, muttering something to himself about them "disturbing his research" and being "oversexed giants" as he'd closed the trapdoor behind them. The second that Dean and Cas had stepped foot back on the Impala, Cas had disappeared somewhere unknown in the recesses of the ship, and Dean had taken over the bridge, banishing everyone but Sam and Bobby. The story had come spilling out more easily than Dean had expected, leaving Dean with Sam's explosive disbelief and Bobby's unreadable reticence.

"It makes sense," Dean said quietly, still staring forwards. "I mean, it fills in a couple'a blanks." He risked a quick glance over to the copilot's seat, where Sam was hanging on his every word. "The night Mom died - the man who killed her seemed to know her. He was an Operative, he was there to take you, Sammy, and he knew her."

"You never told me that," Sam murmured.

"I was _four_ when I saw it," Dean exclaimed. "I thought I'd imagined it until about two hours ago!"

"Alright, pipe down," Bobby cut in. The older man looked harried, eyes sunken beneath the stupid hat he always wore. "It ain't something either of you could have seen coming, so let's leave the yelling 'til you got something real to yell about."

"Bobby?" Sam faltered. "Did, uh - was - did people on Lawrence know what Mom was?"

The wordless moment that followed Sam's question was slightly too long. "'Course not," Bobby said. "No one thought she was an Operative. Operatives were folk legends, stories like Reavers that folk made up to scare kids."

"But Reavers are real," Dean pointed out.

"Yeah, well." Bobby shrugged. "Your mom - she was a spy. Turns out that not every Operative has the same dazzling panorama of social skills as your buddy Castiel. She was charming and beautiful and she had damn near every person on Lawrence tripping over themselves to make her feel at home. We never asked any questions. Never wanted to." He scratched at his beard, sitting back. "Then she married your daddy and had you, and it was like she'd always been there. 'Operative' never entered into our brains."

"... But..." Dean prompted.

"... But. There were moments. She was jumpy. Quick to twitch. Too good with a blade and a gun to be your typical housewife." Bobby shook his head. "I always figured here for a runaway of some kind - bad husband, bad father, bad brother, bad situation somewhere she'd got herself out of. Guess I wasn't wrong."

"You never said anything," Sam said.

"And why would I?" Bobby said fiercely. "She was a good woman, your mother. And she gave us you boys. Ain't anything to say." He stood, brushing his hands on the legs of his jeans. "Now if you muttonheads need some time for your personal crises, I'm gonna go see about breakfast." And he clomped off the bridge without waiting for an answer, leaving Dean and Sam to stare after him.

"Well," Dean said.

"Yeah," said Sam.

They glanced at one another, wide-eyed for a moment, before sinking back into their own chairs. Sam let out a slow breath. "What did Cas say when you found out about Mom?" he asked.

Dean shifted uncomfortably. "Uh -" he stammered, before falling silent.

"_Dean_."

"I, uh -"

"What. Did you do."

"I kind of... accused him of knowing about Mom before this whole thing went down," Dean said. He didn't need to look over at his brother to see the truly astounding look of exasperated incredulity Sam was sporting. "I'm still not convinced he didn't!" Dean protested weakly. "The man's turned 'being cagey' into an international sport - gorrammit, he hid the Angel Tablet in his _chest_ to keep us from finding it."

"You're an idiot," Sam said. "Dean. He came clean to us in a major way. He laid all his cards on the table. Don't you think he would have laid this one out too if he had it?"

Dean clenched his hands even tighter on the controls. "I dunno, man -"

"_Bi Jweh._ You like the guy, and he seems to like you too, for whatever reason. And I don't know what happened between you two down on Persephone - and I don't want to know - but if you throw this away because you're so determined to see problems where there aren't any, then I'm gonna use my Operative superpowers to kick your ass. Got it?"

"Got it," Dean mumbled.

Three hours of metaphorical wound-licking later, the Impala was fast-approaching Ariel, and he needed to grab Cas anyway to make contact with his mysterious former-Operative buddy. With a tortured sigh, Dean slunk out of the relative safety of the bridge to track him down, dreading the prospect of facing his own idiotic mistakes head-on.

But the man wasn't in any of his usual haunts - not his bunk, not the mess, not even the engine room (where Dean interrupted a very grumpy Charlie's nap). Confounded, he wandered down the corridor of crew bunks - and stopped when he heard Cas's voice filtering through a door.

He glanced up at the name on the door. This was Meg's bunk. What the hell was Cas doing in Meg's bunk? Against his better judgment, Dean knelt, pressing his ear close to the crack in the bunk door.

"... do not know if I can," Cas was saying quietly. "My name is on the Angel Tablet as well. My list of transgressions is no less terrible than Michael's. I am an Operative. It is all I have ever known." He paused a moment before continuing, even quieter. "What if I am unable to overcome my training? What if I am cursed to be an Operative forever?"

"Oh, Blue-Eyes, that is just the sweetest pile of shit I ever heard." Meg's voice was a caress, low and sultry.

"Be serious, Meg," he heard Cas admonish.

"I am serious," Meg replied, some of the faux-saccharine syrup draining from her tone. "You think you're the only one on this boat trying to be something better, Castiel? Lemme tell you a little story - before I signed up on the Good Ship Winchester, I worked for my dear departed Daddy. You know who he was?"

"No."

"The son of a bitch called himself Azazel. I see you recognize that name."

"The slave runner."

"That's right. All across the galaxy. And I was his fucking bus driver, ever since I was old enough to wrap my hands around a set of controls. Young, old, male, female - I flew buckets and buckets of people from the frying pan to the fire. You want to talk blood on your hands? Blue-Eyes, I will win this contest every time."

"But Azazel - he died."

Dean could just imagine the wolfish smile splitting Meg's face. "Damn straight he died," she said. "Someone stuck a switchblade in his jugular and shipped his body to the Alliance HQ on Helios. Funny enough, they never did catch that particular culprit. My guess - they didn't look too terribly hard." There was a rustle, as though Meg was shifting position. "We are not who we were sculpted to be, Blue-Eyes. Who we choose to become - that's the important thing. And it's hard - and you will wake yourself up at night with screaming - but we change. We grow. And you're lucky, you know."

"I don't feel lucky."

"Feel lucky. You stumbled onto one of the only ships in this 'verse full of people who want to help you be who you want to be. Capische?"

There was a long moment as Dean and Cas both allowed the words to sink in. Dean was trying to get his mind screwed back in right. The pilot's story had thrown him for a loop. He nearly missed Cas's, "I capische."

"Good. Now get the hell outta my bunk before I do something ungentlemanly to you."

**xXx**

Charlie let out a low whistle as the Impala touched down on the expansive landing pad on Ariel. The pristine concrete stretched for what seemed like miles in every direction, offering one of the smoothest landings Dean had experienced since he assumed control of the Impala ten years before. Even Meg, reinstated behind the controls, raised an eyebrow, impressed.

"You sure we're allowed to land here, Cas?" Dean asked. The other man was standing by the bridge entrance, looking immaculately put-together - a far cry from the rumpled Cas that Dean had helped personally debauch on Persephone.

Cas shot him a cool look and Dean winced inwardly. He hadn't had a chance to apologize yet, and Cas was letting him feel every inch of the cold shoulder. "Of course," he said. "My contact will be meeting us here any minute."

"Then we better get ready," Dean said. "Sam and Bela, you're with me and Cas. Meg, Bobby, and Charlie, I want you to stay back with the ship."

"But - it's so pretty out there -" Charlie protested. The look Dean shot her had her clamping her mouth shut, but it didn't suppress the resentful glare she shot him.

"No arguments," Dean said. "This is crunch time, right here and now. And I'm not gonna lie, there's an elephant-sized chance we'll all be strung up in Alliance custody tomorrow morning. But I'd like to think on the shiny side of this opportunity, _dohn luh mah_?"

The reluctant nods he got from Charlie, Bobby, and Meg would have to be enough, because someone was knocking at the loading bay door. Dean drew in a shaky breath, locking eyes with Castiel. "Okay," he said. "It's showtime."

Because he was the person who had organized this whole meet-up, Dean allowed Cas to be the one to open the cargo doors. The metal slid aside, letting in blinding sunlight - and silhouetting a short male figure. Dean squinted and the man's features swam into focus - lighter brown hair that was on the long side, slicked back from his face, a pair of clever amber eyes, and a nose that was just this side of impressive. The man, in turn, was studying Dean, Sam, and Bela, before fixing his eyes on Cas and waggling his eyebrows.

"Well, well, little brother," the man said. "I was gonna subtract some style points for the dinginess of your ride, but that was before I saw your traveling companions. What catalog did you pick these guys up in? And can I have one?"

"Gabriel," Cas said solemnly, stepping forward. "Thank you for helping us."

"Ah, what was I gonna do," Gabriel said, flapping a hand expressively. "Leave you to be eaten by wolves?"

Cas's eyebrows quirked together. "There are no wolves in space," he said, a shade of confusion coloring his words.

Gabriel clapped Cas on the shoulder. "Don't ever change. C'mon, lemme give you and your unfairly attractive friends the Grand Tour." He extended an arm to Bela, who took it gracefully. "I'm Gabriel, by the way. Since my rude-as-heck brother seems to have forgotten what 'introductions' are."

"Bela," Bela said smoothly. "Charmed to make your acquaintance."

Her smile was blinding, and Gabriel did not seem immune. He blinked at her, then back at Cas. "Style, bro," he said. "I can't say I don't like your style.

The walk to Gabriel's office building was filled with chatter as Gabriel talked and talked and talked and talked. The man seemed to have a talent for making nonsense conversation out of anything and everything at all. Bela joined in occasionally, Sam a bit less frequently, Dean once or twice, and Cas none at all. Every time Dean cast a look over at Castiel, the man was scanning their surroundings, as though expecting that they'd be ambushed at any moment. It was not a comforting thought.

He sidled up to Cas as Gabriel was commenting on the eating habits of the actors in his newest entertainment program. "This guy, Cas?" he whispered. "_This_ guy was an Operative?"

"He and Michael never quite saw eye-to-eye, I believe" Cas responded.

"I can see why," Dean snorted.

"Michael has an even bigger stick up his ass than our little Castiel here," Gabriel said. He turned and flashed them a dazzling smile. "Might not be an Operative anymore, bucko, but I still have the magnificent hearing. One of the perks of the gig. Here we are."

He turned into a blinding glass entryway, holding the door open for the Impala crew and following them inside. "It's just ahead," he said, "through the double-doors. Why don't you guys go ahead and get settled and I'll be there in a sec." He nudged Sam, winking. "Don't wither and die without me, mountain-man."

He was gone before Sam had a chance to reply - he had to resort to shoving Dean, who was doing his best to smother his laughter. "Boys, boys," Bela chided. "Let's do remember we have a mission here today and keep the horseplay to a minimum."

"Right. Okay." Dean straightened. "These doors, he said?" He pushed the doors open.

There was a beautiful meeting room on the other side, all carved oak and shiny surfaces. A gigantic fire crackled in the massive fireplace, and the floors were covered with luxurious carpets. It was warm and soft and gorgeous.

It was also not empty.

Michael stood in the exact center of the room, a perfect smile on his perfect face. He tilted his head as the four of them froze in the doorway, his eyes - cold as marbles - watching them intently.

"Castiel," he said.

Another figure arose from a squishy armchair and turned to give them all a wide grin. "Hello boys," said Crowley. "And Ms. Talbot. What a charming surprise."

The doors slammed shut behind Dean as he turned to make his escape. He found Gabriel standing in front of them, a sorrowful look in his amber eyes. "They arrived right before you did," he said, gaze flicking from Dean to Cas and back. "I'm sorry."

Dean turned back to look at Michael and Crowley, both of whom took in the crew of the Impala with hungry, calculating stares.

_Me, too._


	9. Chapter 9

The sound of constant screaming really did a number on a man's nerves.

Dean had to physically restrain himself from punching the walls as he paced from one end of the tiny room to the other and back again. His knuckles were scraped from where he'd given in to the violent urge before - he clenched his hands into fists and shoved them into his pockets in a wild attempt to stop himself from inflicting even more damage.

"Sit down, would you?"

Sam was slouched against the wall, his eyes closed. Bela lay next to him, her head in his lap. Under any other circumstances, Dean would have found the tableau weirdly intimate - but Bela had just gone about ten rounds with Crowley and his torture technicians. And _damn_ Crowley - the man knew that cutting into Sam and Dean would just piss them off.

"To get under your skin," Crowley had said, grinning at the two brothers, "I'll have to get under hers."

He'd turned his attentions to Bela... and kept them there.

The woman was asleep, or at least giving sleep her best shot. She looked grimier and more disheveled than Dean had ever seen her. Fury zinged through his veins at the sight, and he was so caught up in it that he forgot to respond to Sam's request.

"_Dean_." Sam opened his eyes, looking up at his brother. "Seriously. Sit down. You're not gonna be able to tunnel your way out of here by wearing a hole in the floor."

But Dean was too caught up in his own self-lacerating train of thought to register this. "This is all my fault," he muttered bitterly.

Sam huffed an exasperated sigh. "Here we go."

"If I hadn't dragged you all -"

"How many times did you give us an out, Dean?" Sam snapped. "I lost track. We all followed you and Cas here because we wanted to. Don't flatter yourself with the 'I made this happen' guilt trip. I'd like to see you try to force Bobby to do anything he didn't want to do. Or Charlie. Or - Jesus, especially not Meg." He and Dean shared a shudder.

Another muffled scream filtered through the stainless steel door, and any shreds of self-worth that Dean might have been holding onto burned away. He glared at the door, wishing that he could melt his way through it, that he could fight his way into the hallway and towards that unknown torture chamber somewhere else in the labyrinth of Gabriel's entertainment complex.

They hadn't seen Cas since Crowley and his gang of thugs had hustled Dean, Sam, and Bela out the door. The last glimpse Dean had of the other man had been over his shoulder - Cas had stood, spine ramrod straight, staring up into Michael's blandly smiling face. Cas and the other Operative were roughly the same height, but in that room, in those circumstances, Cas had seemed very, very small.

The only reason that Dean knew Cas was still alive was that the screaming hadn't stopped yet.

"Gorrammit!" Dean's self-control shattered and he took a swing at the cement wall, secretly relishing the way that the impact made the skin and bones of his hand wail with pain. The fire felt so right, in fact, that he just kept punching, landing blow after blow on the rough surface of the concrete. _ "Lio Coh Jwei Ji Neong Hur Ho -"_

"Working out some issues there, big boy?"

Dean whirled. He'd been so absorbed in his wall-punching tantrum that he hadn't noticed the door slide open. Gabriel stood, framed in the light from the corridor beyond, arms crossed. He quirked an eyebrow at Dean.

Dean was stalking towards him without another thought, wrecked hands set to sink into the man's face. He wanted nothing more in that moment than to wipe the perpetual smirk off of Gabriel's lips - as painfully as possible.

"Dean -" he heard Sam caution, but Dean wasn't paying attention, and Sam was too far away (and too laden with his lapful of Bela) to get to him in time to stop him from letting his fist fly directly at Gabriel's face.

He'd forgotten, of course, that despite his negligible height and perpetual showy attitude, that Gabriel was an Operative. Dean found himself stumbling, tripping over his own two feet as he overbalanced, swinging for someone who was simply not there anymore. With a growl he righted himself, staring frantically around the room.

"That is one powerful swing," Gabriel said from directly behind Dean. "Might want to work on your aim, though."

Dean rushed the guy, and once again found himself grappling with air. "Really, bucko?" Gabriel drawled, this time standing to Dean's left. "We gonna keep doing this?"

Dean glared at him, panting. In that moment, an especially wrecked scream tore into the room, even louder now that the door was open. As close to Gabriel as he was, Dean could see a flicker of something - agony? regret? anger? - in the man's golden eyes. But the emotion, whatever it was, was smoothed away in the space of a moment, leaving behind the cocky supercilious affect that seemed as natural to Gabriel as breathing. Sensing that going after this guy again would most likely result in some severely busted bones, Dean shifted out of his fighting stance - but the sting of broken skin over his knuckles was a nice reminder that he could do some damage if he really needed to.

"Good decision," Gabriel said, smiling at Dean sardonically. "Give that brain cell of yours a pat on the back from me."

"Might I inquire as to the nature of this visit?" That was Bela, who had valiantly hauled herself into a sitting position against the wall. Despite the fact that she was wearing quite a bit of her own blood on the outside, she managed to glare quite chillingly up at Gabriel, and Dean swore he saw Gabriel take a slight step back.

"Oh, Mr. Gabriel was just so very concerned as to our general health and well-being, ain't that it?" Dean drawled. He might not be able to knock the guy around, but he'd be damned if he just sat back and let some Fed patsy poke and prod at him. "Really very thoughtful. Hey, _Gabe_, why don't you go check in on Cas? See whether he needs a glass of water or a chocolate or a fucking _new_ _spleen_ or whatever. You know, since you care so much about us."

The fire in Gabriel's eyes could have burned Dean to a cinder where he stood. "Don't you _ever_ presume to know me, _smuggler_," he spat, advancing. Now it was Dean's turn to back up a step.

"I think I got you pretty well pegged, actually," Dean blathered on. His suicidal streak had gotten him this far - seemed dumb as all fuck to let it take the back seat now. "You're a professional coward - you ran away from the Operatives, now you're wimping out when your friend needs you because you're too gorram scared to nut up and -"

He saw the blow coming - anyone would have. But the foresight didn't mean that his ears rang any less or that the fireworks behind his eyes were any less glorious. When he managed to crack open his eyelids again, he was flat on his ass, blinking up at the irate Gabriel who looked just about ready to stomp his head in.

"Alright, that's enough." Sam stepped between his brother and Gabriel, a miles-high forest of jean-clad legs. Dean took advantage of his temporary shelter to rub covertly at his chin, where Gabriel's uppercut had caught him.

"Your brother doesn't know what he's talking about," Gabriel muttered, sounding for all the world like a petulant child.

"As a rule, yeah," Sam agreed. "But I gotta get behind Bela's question - why are you here, Gabriel?"

In the silence that followed, Dean hauled himself painfully to his feet. Bela was watching the scene from her huddled position against the wall, her large eyes shining in the dim light as they flicked back and forth from Gabriel to Sam to Dean and back again.

Gabriel didn't seem to have an answer. Sam took a step forward. "You want reassurance, is that it? You want to know that we're bad people and the universe'll be better off without us. But here's the thing - you _know_ what the Operatives are doing is wrong," Sam said, his voice quiet and imploring. "It's the reason you ran in the first place. Isn't it?"

"You don't know what it's like," Gabriel said.

Sam snorted. "What, running from a bunch of overbearing idiots who want you to be exactly like them - to take orders and say "yes sir" and never question anything? Sorry, Dean -"

"Whatever, bitch."

"- trust me, I understand that situation than most other people. But if you stop us from releasing the Angel Tablet, you'll be an Operative after all. And everything you've built and scraped together since you crawled out of that hell - it'll all be for nothing."

Another scream from the hallway - this one worryingly more weak than the previous ones. Dean clenched his jaw against the question, but it slipped out anyway - "What are they doing to Cas?"

"Reprogramming," Gabriel said flatly, not looking at Dean. "Castiel rebelled. He has a - how did Uriel put it? He's got a 'crack in his chassis'. They're trying to fix that." He shrugged. "Little bro also squirreled the Tablet away somewhere and he's not spilling the beans."

"He didn't bring it with him?"

"Apparently he didn't trust me. Imagine that." Gabriel smiled, but there was no humor there. "He'll talk. Sooner, not later. Michael's got his best guys on the case, and whatever Michael wants, Michael gets." He blinked, slowly, finally meeting Sam's eyes. "I'm sorry," he said. "I really am. But there's only one winning side in this fight, and it's not yours."

"There's only one _right_ side in this fight," Dean said. "And it ain't theirs."

Gabriel drew breath as though he was going to say something - but the unwelcome sudden presence in the doorway had him snapping his mouth closed once more.

"Well isn't this exceptional service?" Crowley smirked. "Not many resorts will have the head honcho checking in on you."

"You're late, Crowley," Dean said. "We did this joke already."

Crowley scowled, but kept his attention on Gabriel. "I'm sure Michael will be very pleased to know the personal interest you seem to have taken in our guests."

"Then let me 'personally' invite you to eat a massive bag of dicks," Gabriel snapped. Dean didn't bother trying to cover up his snort of laughter, but Gabriel was already pushing past Crowley into the corridor, stalking out of sight.

Crowley turned back to the crew of the Impala, eyebrows raised. "Who spit in his noodles?" he asked. The three level glares he received in response did nothing to shake him. Instead he surveyed the three of them with a nearly clinical air, assessing and cool. "It really is a shame that your friends couldn't join us," he observed casually. "I was really looking forward to skinning Meg alive."

The quick glance that Sam shot Dean burned into the skin between Dean's shoulder blades. Crowley and Michael didn't have Meg, Charlie, or Bobby? But if the three of them hadn't been taken along with the Impala - then where in the hell were they?

"In her absence, I suppose I'll have to settle for someone else," Crowley said. His eyes flicked between the three of them, and Dean's muscles trembled with the effort it took not to recoil. Finally a slow smile spread across the criminal's face. "Captain Winchester," he said. "I believe that honor goes to you."

**xXx**

_His footsteps should be clattering on the metal of the catwalk, but everything around him seemed weirdly muted as he moved through the belly of the Impala. Even the lights on the walls were hazy, barely illuminating the way ahead of Dean. It didn't make much of a difference to him - he could find his way through this boat with his eyes closed - he even had a few times, playing Hideaway with Sammy while they waited for Dad to come back from finalizing a deal or drinking himself under some scummy bar table._

_The Impala was deserted, totally empty. It filled Dean with a brimming sense of dread. The Impala wasn't meant to be deserted. It was meant to be filled with people and bickering and laughter. The last time he'd been alone on this boat had been his absolute nadir, the grimy bottom-of-the-barrel moment that Bobby had to scrape him off of and pour him back into himself. _

"_Hello?" Dean called. His voice didn't echo - the walls seemed to swallow the sound. Dean winced, rubbing his forehead. Reality seemed cottony and absorbent, and he didn't like it at all._

"_... wouldn't have had this problem if you'd just listened to me two weeks ago when I told you that compression coil was on its way out. Seriously, Cap, all due respect, but sometimes I wonder if a Reaver snuck into your bunk while you were dozing and sucked out your brains."_

_Charlie's voice was clear as a bell. Dean whirled, searching through the gloom, peering at the door to the entrance room. But he was alone in the Impala - alone as he had ever been. He remembered having this argument with Charlie, though - a few months back. The two of them had sniped back and forth at one another, growing more and more creative and ridiculous until, instead of arguing, they had just collapsed in laughter and put a massive dent in a bottle of whiskey._

"_That the best you got?" It was Meg now, sounding out of breath but vivacious, echoing up from the cargo hold below. Dean leaned against the railing, looking down - the hold was empty. _

"_Hardly," Bela's voice answered, and there was the unmistakeable noise of feet circling one another. "This is just my warmup, darling."_

"_Well let me know," Meg responded. "Wouldn't want to tire you out before you decide to really give it a shot."_

_That sparring match from a few weeks back - Dean had won 500 credits off of Sam by betting on Bela. Now the imageless memory surrounded him, and Dean found himself smiling despite the eerie emptiness._

_The next two voices filtered to Dean from the direction of the mess - Sam and Bobby, a conversation he'd overheard and barely understood as the two of them swapped book recommendations and debated ancient Earth-that-Was mythology. "I ain't saying that Odin wasn't a self-absorbed prick and a half," Bobby had said, "but it's Kali I wouldn't want to cross."_

"_Oh man," Sam replied. "Have you read Suarez's Destruction and Creation? Get this - a belt of skulls. How nuts is that?"_

_Dean had teased both of them for being massive nerds, but the exchange had tickled the part of his brain that would always be proud of Sam and grateful for Bobby, warming something deep in his chest at the same time._

"_Dean."_

_He was suddenly aware that he was no longer alone on the Impala. Slowly he turned, and found Castiel standing halfway down the catwalk from him. The man looked like hell, bruised, battered, bloody - like he'd just been worked over by a cutlery drawer._

_Dean stumbled up the catwalk towards him, but despite the fact that he remained standing still, Cas seemed to move forever out of his reach. He met Dean's eyes with his own wide, pained, brilliant blue ones._

"_Hell, Cas -"_

"_You have to wake up."_

"_Cas, you look -"_

"_Dean. Wake up."_

"Dean."

"_Now, Dean. Wake! Up!"_

"Dean!"

Dean drew in a massive breath, shooting up into a sitting position and nearly knocking foreheads with Sam. His brother scrambled back just in time, leaving Dean to register the screaming pain in his torso and the pounding thumping in his head.

"Sammy - what -"

"Come on, Dean," Sam said, hauling himself to his feet and stretching out a hand to help Dean do the same. "We have to go."

"We have to -?" It was then that Dean saw the slight form of Gabriel silhouetted in the door. "What is he -?"

"Being very, very stupid," Gabriel whispered. "You're lucky your brother has such good puppy-dog eyes. Up and at 'em, princess, you gotta get gone before Michael and his cronies realize what's up."

"Cas," Dean said through gritted teeth. He felt like he'd been run over ten times by Meg's transpo, and he made a mental note to make sure Crowley felt even worse sometime in the near future. "We've gotta get Cas -"

"They've got him locked up tight," Gabriel said, shaking his head.

"We can't leave him."

"Trying to get him out would be suicide."

"I'm not leaving here without him," Dean insisted. "He's one of us." He glanced back at Sam and Bela. Sam's nod and Bela's oblique shrug of acquiescence were about as close to ringing support as he was going to get.

Gabriel's eyes narrowed. "I didn't sign up for a kamikaze storming-of-the-beaches," he said. "You guys want to throw your bacon into the fire, fine. But I'm not waiting around for Michael to stick something sharp in my liver. I'm blowing this popsicle stand."

"You cowardly sonuva -"

"Dean," Sam hissed. The intensity in his brother's eyes was enough to have Dean shutting up. Sam turned back to Gabriel and extended a hand. "Thanks," he said. "For letting us out."

Gabriel inspected the hand closely for a moment before clasping it and shaking it himself. "You're Mary Campbell's son, aren't you?" he asked. Sam nodded, slightly and Gabriel pulled a smile that wasn't quite a smile. "I can tell. Be seeing you boys. I hope."

And he was gone so quickly it was as though he hadn't been there in the first place.

Bela, Sam, and Dean made laborious progress down the corridor, quickly getting lost in the labyrinthine depths of the entertainment complex. It was apparently late at night - they only had to dodge Alliance security details twice, ducking once into a storage closet and once into a massive, dark room that was probably some sort of studio. But there was something about the silence that ate at Dean's nerves - something that gnawed at the back of his mind, setting off alarms that he couldn't quite track until he finally, finally figured out why.

The screaming had stopped.

Dean stumbled over his own feet as the thought seared across his mind. The constant backdrop of Castiel's agony had ended, which meant that Michael had either decided to leave him alone, or - or -

Dean picked up the pace, glancing through door after door.

It was Bela who found the room they were looking for. "Captain," she hissed, peering through the small window set into one door. She was holding her left arm close to her chest - she insisted that there wasn't anything wrong with it, but Dean had broken enough bones in his life to know a shattered wrist when he saw it. But he let the thief hold onto her pride for the moment - there was nothing any of them could do about it anyway.

Dean slunk up next to her and looked into the room. There were two figures inside - one slumped on the floor in an approximation of a human form, the other in Alliance uniform, leaning over the prone man. Dean's breath caught in his throat as he watched the Alliance officer reach into his coat for something - a gun? A knife?

He was through the door before his brain had a chance to realize what he was doing, launching himself at the Fed with every ounce of strength in his weakened body. "Get away from him you sonuvabitch -" he hissed, knocking the officer to the ground.

It was only when the officer was staring up at him through very, very familiar dark eyes that Dean had a moment to recap the last few seconds. The door had been unlocked. The Alliance officer's hands were empty - not a single weapon in sight. And the officer himself -

_herself_ -

"_Wu De Ma_, Cap," Meg swore, pushing herself up onto her elbows. Her cap had been knocked off her head in the tussle and her hair coiled down around her shoulders. "Warn a girl before you try to sweep her off her feet, would'ja?"

"Meg?" Dean gaped like an idiot.

"If you missed me this bad, Dean-o, all you had to do was write me a letter or something."

"What the hell are you doing here?" Sam asked. "And why are you dressed like -"

"Like it?" Meg asked, the corner of her mouth ticking up. "I got it from a very nice young officer, who was only too happy to give it to me in return for not being filled with puncture wounds."

"You're scary sometimes," Bela observed calmly.

"Thanks."

Most of this exchange was so much white noise to Dean, whose attention was glued to the heap of human that was Castiel. The man lay on his side, one arm outstretched. His eyes were open, staring, unseeing, and it was only the slight rise and fall of his chest that let Dean know he was even alive. "Cas," Dean whispered, kneeling beside the man and grasping his shoulder.

"Cas, c'mon buddy. Can you hear me?"

"No one's home, Cap," Meg said, all traces of humor drained from her voice. "I poked and I prodded, but he's not listening." She pulled something out of her pocket - the small disc of the Angel Tablet shone dully in the fluorescent lighting. "Blue-Eyes paid me a visit back on the Impala before you went off with Gabriel. Planted it on me, the sneaky bastard. I didn't even realize I had it until just before the Alliance came knocking on the cargo-bay door and Bobby, Charlie and I had to make a quick getaway."

"Bobby and Charlie are safe?" Sam asked. "Where are they?"

"Doing something unspeakable to the command center of this building," Meg said, tapping the comm in her ear. "Nothing I have the patience for. I decided to take a little walk." Ger eyes were as glued to the unmoving Cas as Dean's were. "What's wrong with him, Cap?"

"'Reprogramming,' Gabriel said," Dean murmured. "Trying to restore him to Operative factory settings."

"They can't do that," Meg said fiercely. "He's not that person anymore."

Dean leaned closer to Cas. "Cas, we need you to wake up. Come back to us, buddy." Still nothing. Dean squeezed the man's shoulder, sending up a quick prayer to a god he didn't even believe in. "We gotta go home, Cas. Come on. It's time to go home."

He might have been imagining it, but there seemed to be a flicker of something in Cas's eyes, a quick burst of recognition that dulled the no-one-there emptiness of his blue gaze. But Dean didn't have much time to analyze it because -

"Fancy this. Looks like our little chickies are trying to fly the coop."

At this point in their relationship, just the sound of Crowley's voice was enough to raise Dean's hackles. He stood, glaring back at the door, where Crowley watched them. The criminal was framed by three extremely large, well-muscled thugs, all of whom looked more than capable of ripping Dean limb-from-limb without breaking a sweat.

"I'm impressed, Captain," Crowley continued. "Most men who get put through the wringer like you have a difficult time even breathing afterwards - and here you are, walking and talking. As tough as you are pretty."

"I'm getting tired of these unannounced visits, Crowley," Dean said. "It's not polite."

"Calm down, cupcake," Crowley said. "I'm not an unreasonable man. I've told Michael that you're out and about, of course, but I am more than willing to keep him running in circles while you and your lovely gang of thieves make a getaway." He smiled, sticking his hands in his pockets. "For a fee, of course."

"You want the Angel Tablet," Sam said.

"Ding-ding-ding! So what do you say? The chance to rid yourselves of a troublesome artifact and get out of here with your lives more or less intact? Opportunities like this don't come around all that often." He cocked his head to the side. "You've got five seconds to make up your minds. Looks like little Castiel isn't going to last much longer than that anyway. Going once... going twice..."

Dean nearly bit off his tongue with a swallowed-back swear as Bela stepped forward, a sickening smile on her face. "Crowley," she said, her voice honey-sweet and low. "We have had a mutually beneficial business relationship in the past, and I have enjoyed making disgusting amounts of money with you." Dean's heart sank, and he remembered the way that Bela had urged him to take Crowley's blank check and sell out Castiel not one week before.

But it seemed like the day wasn't done landing surprises in his lap, because Bela continued. "But trust me," she said, "when I tell you that you are an earth-munching parasite. In short, Mr. Crowley - fuck you and fuck your deal and fuck off."

If Dean could bottle the goggling expression on Crowley's face, he would have. The man gaped at Bela for a solid moment before flushing a bright red. "Fine," he said through his clenched teeth. "Lucky for you, I am more than willing to settle our differences once and for all. Bloodily."

He didn't have a chance to keep monologuing - Meg threw herself at him with a feral yell and a terrifying grin. One of Crowley's muscle-bound hired-hands intercepted her, grabbing at her wrist and twisting it behind her back. But Meg was too quick to be taken out like that - wherever the thug grabbed was exactly where she wasn't, and the man was kept chasing her in circles like a dog trying to bit off his own tail.

Bela and Sam exchanged shrugs and followed suit. Despite Bela's broken wrist and whatever other injuries she was most likely covering up, she made a good showing for herself, landing kick after punishing kick on another one of Crowley's goons. Sam was just sam - brutal and calculated, dodging and ducking and punching with an ease born of too many barroom brawls.

It was Crowley who advanced on Dean and Castiel, seemingly oblivious to the mayhem unravelling behind him. He watched Dean with eyes as cold as a shark's, obviously taking in each and every weak point on Dean's body and filing the information away to be exploited sometime in the near future. "You're not looking your best, Captain," he sneered.

"Maybe not," Dean retorted. "But I can still take you."

For a man as short and somewhat squat as Crowley, he moved with surprising speed and strength. Dean was on his back on the floor before he even knew what hit him, Crowley's hands around his throat, digging, squeezing, crushing -

"Is that so?" Crowley asked, fury making his breath come in short pants. "Because I rather think I'm going to kill you now. And then I am going to stick a blade through your boyfriend over there. And I am going to fly off this idiot planet and never, ever return."

The edges of Dean's vision were starting to dim. Sam, Bela, and Meg were all wrapped up in their own battles on the other side of the room. Even if they noticed, there was no way they'd be able to extricate themselves in time. And even though Cas was lying not three feet away, he was catatonic, paralyzed, trapped in his own head -

Dean rolled his eyes, trying to find something to use as a weapon, to get Crowley off of him - but there was nothing. The world was growing fuzzy and distant, and Dean had one last moment to curse himself for not paying attention to Bela's self-defense lessons when he had the chance -

Castiel hit Crowley like a hurricane, bearing the man to the floor. His fists flew so quickly that, to Dean's oxygen-deprived eyes, they actually _blurred_. Dean flipped onto his stomach, gasping and coughing as air burned its way down his bruised and sore throat. He was still trying to get his breath back when he heard the unmistakeable sound of important bones _snapping_, and he looked up in time to see Cas's fists still. The Operative dropped his arms to his side, staring down at the motionless body of Crowley, whose head was lying at an angle that human heads were not supposed to assume.

He sat without speaking for too long. Dean crawled over to him, laying a hand on his leg. "... Cas?" he whispered, feeling his voice croak through his vocal cords.

Cas met his eyes, and for one heart-stopping moment, Dean thought he didn't recognize him. But then - Cas's lips were on his, searing into his skin and his heart, and it was all Dean could do to grab hold of Cas's bloodstained shirt and not let the other man go until the both of them were gasping for air.

They separated, faces a bare centimeter apart. "Alright, Dean," Cas said, his voice familiar and gravelly. "Let's do this. And then let's go home."

**xXx**

"Still in one piece there, Captain?"

Charlie's warm voice filtered in over the comm in Dean's ear, and despite his myriad aches and pains, he smiled. His crew was still alive. He was still alive. He had a mission. He was moving forward. Things were shitty as fuck, yeah, but they weren't dead yet.

"More or less," he said. "What's our next move?"

Meg hadn't been pleased to part ways with Dean, Sam, and Cas, but Dean had insisted. Bela, who had literally single-handedly kicked the ass of one of Crowley's hired goons, was in no shape to keep pressing forward. Dean had forced her to go with Meg. "I'm gonna need my boat back," he told them. "And I don't trust anyone else to fly her but you, Meg."

"Sounds like some infiltration may be necessary, if the Feds have her on lockdown," Bela said.

"Which is where you come in," Dean said. "I'm counting on you two. Don't you let me down."

Meg had pressed her comm into his hand before she and Bela had disappeared to nefarious parts unknown. Dean had wasted no time in checking in with Charlie and Bobby, reassuring them that yes, he was still alive and no, he wasn't gonna give up on this "damn fool plan" (Bobby's words) just because a maniac or two had tried to stick a knife in him.

"What's the plan, then?" Bobby had grumbled when it became clear he couldn't convince Dean to just get the hell out of there. "I'm assuming you got one since you're being so hard-headed about this whole gorram thing."

"Just like our adventure on Crowley's ship," Dean had replied. "You're my eyes and ears in the control room. We need to find someplace in this fucking fortress to upload the Angel Tablet - and you need to tell us how to get there without getting collared by the Feds."

Now they were making their painstaking way up the back stairs and through the tiny forgotten niches of the massive entertainment complex. Of course the one place in this whole godforsaken castle with unfettered access to the Cortex was Gabriel's office, and of course the peacocking douche-bag had his office on the top floor, the furthest possible point from where Dean, Sam, and Cas had started.

"Wait there a moment," Charlie ordered as the trio prepared to round a bend on a narrow staircase. "There's a couple security guards coming up the hallway." Dean gestured frantically for Sam and Cas to stop, and they froze in their tracks, listening to the footsteps of the two guards as they walked up and down the linoleum. In the moment of silence, Dean tried to catch Cas's eye, but the man was avoiding his gaze, his face shuttered and expressionless. He shut down a twinge in the base of his stomach - he did not have time to worry about things like their weird-ass relationship right now.

"Alright, you're clear," Charlie's voice filtered in again. "Just two more floors, then you'll be at the top. There's no one on the top floor, so you should have a clear shot all the way to Gabriel's office."

Dean nodded, knowing that she would be able to see on the security cameras, and the trio continued on in silence. They climbed as quietly as they could, Dean doing his best to ignore the worried glances Sam kept throwing his way. His injuries were really making themselves known - every breath burned down his throat and into his lungs like acid, but this wasn't the moment to whinge and bitch about a bruised larynx or two.

True to Charlie's promise, there was a clear shot to the ornate double-doors of Gabriel's office. Dean paused outside, Sam at his right and Cas at his left. The three of them stared at the wood for a long moment, not moving.

"There aren't any cameras inside," Charlie told them, sounding grim. "I can't tell you what's in there."

"You idjits know this is probably a trap, right?" Bobby said.

"Yeah," Dean said. "Probably a trap." Sam and Cas nodded, almost in-synch. And Dean pushed the doors open.

Sure enough, Michael was inside, lounging behind Gabriel's desk (gigantic and mahogany and probably worth more than everything on Lawrence combined). But he wasn't the person that captured Dean's attention. Nor was it the massive shape of Uriel who stood, grumpy-faced, at Michael's right hand.

Instead, Dean found himself staring at the third person in the room - a man of average height and average build and average everything - a man who seemed designed, perfectly calibrated to blend into the background. A man Dean would never forget.

The Shadow Man.

He looked up at Dean with a sort of mild disinterest - then stared, with laser-focus at Sam. Dean found himself wondering when the man was going to start licking his lips.

"Lucifer," Cas breathed, and the Shadow Man smiled.

"It's Castiel, isn't it?" Lucifer said. "Michael's told me all about you. Seems you're something of a celebrity among the Operatives these days."

Cas took an aborted step forward. "You - you killed Anna -"

"Well, yes, I guess," Lucifer said with a nonchalant shrug. "But she was the one who went off-book. I prefer to think that she killed herself. I just happened to hold the knife for her."

Dean's hand slammed down on Cas's shoulder, stopping him from rushing the guy. A sly smile spread across Lucifer's lips as his eyes flicked from Dean to Castiel. "Now, now, brother," Lucifer said. "Let's not forget our manners. Aren't you going to introduce me to your friends?"

There was an annoyed huff from Uriel, who was obviously not a fan of this particular method of time-wasting, but Dean was fascinated to see that the man who had been so intimidating a few nights back seemed utterly terrified to actually speak up in Lucifer's presence.

Michael, on the other hand, had no such qualms. "Really, Lucifer," he chided. "Can't we move this along? You know very well who these two gentlemen are."

Lucifer's eyes scanned Sam from head to toe, and then back up again. "Too right," he said. He moved towards Sam, and this time he really did lick his lips. "You should have been mine, you know," he said. "You were meant to be mine. I was sent to fetch you, and your whore mother got in the way - but you were meant to be mine."

"You alway were a possessive dick, Luci."

Would Gabriel ever tire of making dramatic entrances? Dean severely doubted it. The shorter man leaned against one of the ornamental book cases, which had slid back to reveal a dark passage beyond it. He elbowed one book, seemingly at random, and the bookshelf slid back into position silently. Striding forward, Gabriel leaned his hands on the massive desk, staring into Lucifer's pale, deranged eyes. "Also, it's not nice to call dead people names."

"You're being foolish, Gabriel," Uriel said. "This is not a battle you want a part of."

"You're right there," Gabriel said. "I mean, Team One is the plaid-twins and Mr. Literal over there. Team Two is you junkless fun-Nazis." He shrugged, picking up a statue off his desk and contemplating it. "Then again, Mary Campbell saved my life on a number of occasions. And she had the good sense to get out of this game - good sense shared by yours truly, I might add. So if there's gonna be a side I'm picking in this little conflict, it's gonna be hers."

On the last word, he swung the statue, catching Uriel across the face with a painful _thud_. The man staggered back, clutching at his cheekbone where a long gash had opened. Michael surged to his feet, eyes blazing.

"Fine," he spat, all remnants of his polite demeanor gone. "If that's how you want it -" And he threw himself at Gabriel, drawing a blade seemingly out of nowhere.

Lucifer advanced on Sam, a hungry look in his eyes. Sam straightened his shoulders, preparing to face off against the man, and Dean began to move to his brother's side - but Castiel's hand on his shoulder stopped him.

"No," Cas rasped. "You aren't an Operative. If you try to fight any of these men, they will kill you."

"I can't just sit around and _watch -"_

"Then don't." Cas pressed something into Dean's hand. When he opened his fingers he saw the disc with the Angel Tablet nestled in his palm. "Gabriel's computer - go -"

And he whirled to land a punishing blow to Uriel's stomach. Dean stood, stunned for a long moment, watching the fighters crash and smash around the room, wishing he could join in and knowing, sickeningly, that he would be more of a hobble than a help if he tried. "Fuck it," he muttered, and ducked a chair thrown by Michael, dodging around the corner of the desk as Cas smashed into the floor behind him. Clenching his jaw against the powerful urge to attack Uriel with nothing more than his teeth and fingernails, Dean tapped twice on the computer built into Gabriel's desk to bring up the monitor.

The setup was unlike anything Dean, consummate luddite that he was, had ever encountered before. "Charlie," he grated into the comm. "Help?"

"What is that noise?" Charlie asked, sounding a bit panicked. "Who's fighting?"

Behind him, Sam hit the wall. Hard. "Everyone," Dean replied. "How do I get this information onto the Cortex?"

He tried to focus on Charlie's words as she walked him through the process, but it was so difficult to concentrate when everyone he cared about was being beaten to a pulp behind him. Finally he was able to plug the disc into the drive. It was only as Charlie was saying, "Right, now all you have to do is hit the big green button -" that someone dragged him away from the console.

"You're mine," Michael snarled, handsome face an ugly, twisted mask of rage. Gabriel lay prone on the floor behind him, not moving. "You and your _insect_ of a brother have been thorns in my side for long enough. I am going to burn you and everyone who has ever followed you. I am going to burn your ship and your planet and everything in your life. _You. Are. Mine_."

The world seemed to freeze in that moment as Michael's words poured into Dean's ears, and suddenly he was back in his muddled dream - alone on the Impala, but not alone at all, surrounded by memories of family and friends. And there was Castiel, standing in front of him, smiling his small beaming grin.

"_Let's go home," he'd said._

Dean poured every last inch of strength he had into the elbow he leveled at Michael's face, ramming the joint directly into Michael's nose. He heard, rather than felt, the pop of his elbow dislocating, but he didn't have time for pain. It was enough, though - enough to loosen Michael's grip on his arm, enough to turn, enough to _hit the green button, the green button , Dean!_ Enough to see the progress bar zoom to 100% - for the information to flow onto the Cortex -

Enough for Michael's fist to come down -

Enough for the lights to go out.


	10. Chapter 10

"Ow."

The word rasped in Dean's throat like sandpaper, dry and near-inaudible, scraping along his vocal cords and past his teeth. He licked his lips and tried again.

"Ow."

"I heard you the first time, hold your horses."

The voice was low and female - he didn't recognize it right away. Curiosity piqued, Dean dragged his eyelids up a fraction, waiting for the world to resolve into something decipherable, for the mass of blurry lines and shapes to sharpen.

It wasn't an unpleasant image that greeted him when his vision finally settled. A tall woman was leaning over him, pressing cool fingers to his head along his hairline, applying a light pressure. He hissed when she hit a bruised, sensitive spot, jerking back.

The woman straightened, brushing long blonde curls back over her shoulder. There was something familiar about her - Dean knew he'd seen her somewhere before, but whether it was his concussion or just his shitty memory, he couldn't quite place her. She cocked an eyebrow at him, as though reading his scrambling thoughts. "He got you good, huh?"

"Yeah," Dean rasped. The woman held out a glass of water, and he tried to reach for it with his right hand - and yelped at the stab of pain that shot up to his shoulder from his elbow. Snatching his arm back, Dean noticed for the first time that it had been carefully wrapped and strapped - and that it throbbed.

"Sorry about that," the woman said, placing the water carefully into Dean's left hand. "You dislocated your elbow, and there were some fractures along the joints. I had to strap it up so you wouldn't do any more damage. Does it hurt?"

"It's fine."

"'Fine,' huh? Here." The woman placed two white pills on the blanket next to Dean, watching him with a wry smile as he picked them up and downed them. "Sam told me that if you said you were 'fine' then I should try to dose you up with as much pain medication as possible."

The mention of his brother's name brought the woman's identity rushing back to Dean. "Jess?" he hazarded, and was rewarded with a bright smile. "Where's Sammy?"

"Outside," Jess said. "He was getting in my way with all the hovering so I had to kick him out."

"He's okay?"

"Better than you. The guy heals up fast."

"One of the perks of the gig," Dean muttered, recalling Gabriel's words from earlier. Then, as his brain kicked into higher gear - "We back on Lawrence?"

"For over a day now," Jess nodded. "Ellen tells me you limped in around sunup yesterday."

"Limped -" Dean scrambled to his feet, ignoring the protests from his arm and his bruised head. "What in the gorram hell did they do to my baby?"

He lurched from the door. "Captain Winchester -" Jess groaned behind him, but Dean was gone before she had the chance to wrangle him back to the bed.

He was at the Roadhouse, which he only realized when he stumbled down the stairs into the bar. Since it was only midday, the place was more or less deserted - apart from Bela, Meg, and Gabriel, who were gathered around a vid screen set into the wall.

"There it is!" Gabriel shouted, clapping Meg on the shoulder so hard that she staggered. The sound of something shattering filtered through the beat-up speakers around the screen. "You, my friend, are terrifying."

"Wait, wait, hold on - wait for it - there!" Meg threw back her head and cackled. "That jump! It's amazing."

It was Bela who noticed Dean's entrance. She looked back over her shoulder at him through an eye that had swollen practically shut. Her left arm was hobbled as well - encased in a hard plaster cast and resting in a sling. For a moment, her face was unreadable through the bruises. Then her face split in a wide, sincere smile. "Captain," she greeted him. "You're up."

"Hey there, bucko!" Gabriel exclaimed, silencing the vid. "Finally decided to join us, huh?"

Meg didn't say anything. Instead she walked up to Dean and punched him in his good arm. "Hey!" Dean exclaimed. "What was that for?"

"You started a brawl without me," Meg said sweetly. "Not fair."

Dean just rolled his eyes. "You all in one piece?"

"More or less," Bela said. Meg nodded.

That out of the way, Dean turned his attention to Gabriel. "What the hell," he said, "are you doing here?"

Gabriel clapped a hand to his chest, gaping at Dean in mock-shock. "Really, I am hurt!" he said. "After everything I did for you -" Dean just glared, and Gabriel smirked at him. "Your brother asked me to tag along for now," he continued. "I think he's got a soft spot for me. Might want to keep an eye on that. I have a weakness for overgrown puppydogs."

"Gabriel."

"Fine. Ugh. I pretty much blew all my covers in our little showdown back on Ariel, and I needed a getaway. Sam offered your ship. I took him up on it."

"Great," Dean deadpanned.

"Don't go getting all upset on me now, Deanerino," Gabriel said, his eyes sparkling. "I'll be out of your hair soon enough."

"Yeah? How soon is soon?"

Gabriel waggled his eyebrows. "That," he said, "would be telling."

"Dean?"

For a heart-stopping second, Dean thought the gigantic crate of whiskey was going to slip from Sam's nerveless fingers and crash to the floor. His giant of a brother was standing in the doorway to the Roadhouse back room, staring at Dean with an expression that would not have been out of place on the face of a four-year-old. Dean felt his lips twist in sad recognition - he'd comforted that same look off Sammy's face more times than he could count.

"Hey, Sammy."

The crate of booze hit the floor - gently, much to Dean's astonishment - and Sam was across the room in a few strides, wrapping Dean in a rib-crushing hug. "Ah - ah - arm, arm, arm-" he protested.

"Jesus, sorry -" Sam backed off, but he kept one hand on Dean's shoulder, as though he was worried his brother was going to slip away. "You're okay?" he asked, his eyes searching Dean's.

Dean smiled wryly. "I guess," he said. "My head's still swimming from being under so long - and seriously, what was up with that?"

Sam shrugged, letting him go. All of a sudden, he seemed to be unable to meet Dean's eyes. "You were pretty messed up after Michael got to you," he said. "On the Impala - you were raving and flailing, and we were afraid you were gonna hurt yourself. So Bobby suggested that we put you under, just until we could get you to Jess."

"Remind me to yell at him for that," Dean said, rubbing his eyes. "I still feel like everything's wrapped in cotton." He glared at Sam. "And what's this I hear about the Impala having to limp her way to Lawrence?"

His brother winced. "You watch the vid yet?"

"What vid?"

"Oh boy," Gabriel chuckled. "Gather 'round, kids. Seriously, this is one of my favorite things I've ever seen." He walked to the vid screen and tapped a few buttons. An image - security footage - sprung up, an exterior view of the top floor of Gabriel's entertainment complex. Dean could see through the window glass into the office, where his crew and the Operatives were locked in familiar combat. There was Sam, mid-tackle, grabbing Lucifer around the waist. Uriel was sprawled on the floor, evidently out for the count - and Dean himself, equally out, Michael looming over him -

- and Cas, who seemed to be sprinting for Michael, a look of calm determination on his face. Dean blinked.

"Hey," he said, glancing back at Sammy. "Where is Cas, anyway?"

xXx

The quality of the security footage was impressive, but Dean had a hard time absorbing it. As the vid played, he watched Meg fly the Impala to the window outside of Gabriel's office. He watched the cargo bay door open and Bobby and Bela to open fire on the heavy-duty glass. He watched Michael and Lucifer duck for cover, watched Gabriel and Sam grab Dean's unconscious body, watched them brace themselves at the blasted-open window and leap into the cargo bay -

watched Cas refuse to follow them.

In the footage, Gabriel was screaming something back at Cas. Sam was waving his arms like a crazy person, beckoning Cas onto the Impala. There were Alliance patrols beginning to swoop in, to fire on the Impala - and many of their shots were landing, were burning along his baby's hull. The team was running out of time.

But Cas just watched the crew in the cargo bay, shaking his head. Even from the distance of the camera, Dean could see Cas's lips move.

"What did he say?" he asked dully.

Sam cleared his throat. "He said, uh - he said he'd hold them all off. Until we could get clear."

Dean nodded, just once. His head felt heavy. His arm hurt. He wanted to go back to sleep. "Oh."

"He's alive, Cap." That was Meg, quieter than he was used to hearing her. "An, uh, old acquaintance of mine saw a man who looked like Blue-Eyes stealing a one-man junker at Eastern Shipyard and heading off-world."

"'Acquaintance'?" Dean asked, raising an eyebrow. Eastern Shipyard was a haven for drug, slave, and gun-runners - no one of any sort of reputable nature hung out there.

"You don't want to know."

"We haven't heard from Cas yet," Bela spoke up.

"And my bet's that you won't," Gabriel said. "He's ghosting. Li'l bro spent all his chips on this suicide mission. He shows his face again, he's toast." He hit a button on the vid screen and it went dark. "Your Angel Tablet upload hit the 'verse like a ton of bricks, my friend. People won't take so kindly to knowing they've been messed around all their lives. Michael's in the wind - Lucifer, too. You don't want to know what happened to Uriel when he got found." An unaffected shudder ran through Gabriel. "His throat was - he doesn't have one anymore."

"Cas'll be back," Dean said quietly.

He pretended not to see the pity in Sam's eyes. "Dean -"

"You're right," Meg agreed, glaring fiercely at Sam and Gabriel. "He will."

The bites the Alliance cruisers had taken out of the Impala were not exactly small. Dean had to bite back a series of increasingly colorful curses as he took in the damage, walking in a careful circle around the hull and cataloging each laser burn, each dent, and each fissure. He was so wrapped up in his pained inspection that he didn't notice Charlie at his elbow until he'd made it back to the cargo bay doors.

"Looks worse than it is," Charlie told him. Dean jumped, jarring his elbow. "They chased us out of atmo, but by that time the Tablet upload was hitting the Cortex hard - I think they figured they had bigger fish to fry. Most of the damage is superficial."

"Doesn't mean it doesn't hurt," Dean said, stroking the metal of the hull with one gentle hand.

"Yeah." Charlie wrapped her arms around Dean's chest and squeezed him tight. "She got us here safe, though. Warrior-woman, our Impala." He shot her a smile - it stretched at his cheek muscles - felt out-of-place on his face. "Superficial or not," Charlie continued, "it'll be a fair few days 'fore we'll be airbound again. Should, uh - should we be worried about the Operatives finding us?"

Dean inspected the interior of the Impala. Things didn't seem as damaged inside as they had on the exterior. "Like you said," he told her. "Bigger fish."

xXx

Lucifer's laughter was languid and mocking, ringing through Dean's ears like a taunting alarm. He struggled to move, but something held his arms back. He could feel straps being fastened, tight, around his wrists, but the person tying the bonds was out of his line of sight.

"Oh, Dean," Lucifer said, staring down at him with an expression that was disgustingly near pity. "Always jumping into the fire to save your friends. Always too late."

And suddenly Cas was in front of Lucifer, slumped on the floor in exactly the same position he'd been in when Dean had found him at Gabriel's entertainment complex. The straps bit into Dean's wrists as he strained, trying to free himself, to save Cas. But Lucifer was already bending over the prone man, a wicked-looking blade in his hands, shining sickeningly in light from an unknown source. "He begged to see you," Lucifer said, his voice still calm, still strangely compassionate. "Before we took his voice. He wanted to know you were alright."

"Please," Dean choked out, fighting back something that felt suspiciously like a sob.

"Hm?"

"Please. Let me - can I - ?"

He couldn't finish the sentence. Lucifer looked past Dean to his unseen captor. "What do you think?" he asked. "Should we let Dean say goodbye to his lover before the end?"

Footsteps. A tall figure moved around Dean, stepping between him and Castiel.

Sam.

Dean's brother smiled. "I don't think that'll be necessary," he said.

And Lucifer raised his blade -

The sound of his own shouting was what shook Dean awake. He flailed, straining his screwed-up elbow, and cursing at the top of his lungs as the damaged limb protested.

"Tah Ma Duh," he muttered once he got his bearings again. He was in his bunk aboard the Impala, but without the lulling rumble of the engine, the room seemed to close in on him. He sat on the edge of his bed, breathing in the darkness, wiping the sweat from his forehead with his good arm.

There was no use in sitting in the pitch-black room until morning (which was still several hours away). With a sigh, Dean fumbled around on the floor for his discarded boots and shoved his feet into them.

Crisp, cool air filled his lungs the moment he stepped through the cargo bay doors. It was getting damn near autumn on Lawrence, and he was barely on the comfortable side of chilly as he set off into the night, his feet taking him forward without consulting his brain. He allowed himself to just walk along the dusty dirt roads, reveling in the sense of comfortable mystery.

It had been four days since he'd awoken in the Roadhouse. "A few days" of repairs had translated, in Charlie-speak, to over a week. Dean had a sneaking suspicion that Jo's increased presence in and around the Impala had something to do with the drawn-out work time, but he didn't begrudge Charlie.

And now, in the dark, without the denial-granting powers of daytime to help him, Dean couldn't help but give in to the thought that had plagued him practically since he'd opened his eyes under pretty Jess's care - _T_he longer we stay on Lawrence, the easier it'll be for Cas to find us.

He glanced up at the stars overhead, empty and beckoning and silent, and sent out an unspoken plea. Come on, Cas.

Where the hell are you, man?

It took him a moment to realize that his feet had stopped moving. He looked around. There, gaunt and skeletal, stood the burned-out silhouette of the old Winchester homestead. And in front of the ruin was, as ever, Sam.

"We gotta stop meeting like this," Dean said, walking up to stand beside his brother.

Sam's shoulders shook in a silent, quick huff of laughter. "Yeah," he said. Silence stretched between the two for a moment. "I've been coming out here every night since we landed," he finally admitted with a shrug. "Looking for answers, I guess."

"Answers?"

"Mom. Mostly." Sam shot his brother a quick glance, looking for all the world like a grieving little boy. "Why she did it." Then, all in a rush, as though he couldn't help himself - "She died for me, Dean. 'Cuz I'm a freak. She wanted to make sure I didn't grow up the way that she did. She died protecting me and none of us even knew why." His eyes were shining with unshed tears. "That's on me. That's always gonna be on me."

"Hey, hey -" Dean reached out and wrapped his brother in a tight hug. "That's never on you. Never." He pulled back and made sure that Sammy was looking him right in the eye. "What Mom did was her choice. Okay? She loved you, Sammy. She did everything she did because she loved - hell, because she loved both of us. And Dad. If she could see you now, she'd be proud."

"Why? Because I'm a smuggler?" Sam asked with a watery smile.

"Because you're one of the best gorram smugglers in this godforsaken 'verse," Dean said. "But - and so help me I will kick your ass if you ever tell anyone I got this chick flick-y with you - mostly because you're smart as all hell, and you got a heart to match that Gigantor brain, you Sasquatch. You're a good person."

"I'm a freak," Sam whispered.

"Yeah, well," Dean said, punching his brother lightly on the arm. "Join the club."

They stood side by side in front of the old house until the sun began poking its head above the horizon, bathing the whole scene in a (kinda tasteless, Dean thought) pink glow. When it all became a bit too much, he turned to Sam. "Come on," he said. "Ellen still makes a mean breakfast when you catch her in the right mood."

"What makes you think she's in the right mood?"

"'Cuz Bobby's here, and Jo tells me he's been 'stayin' over' if you know what I mean."

Sam's face twisted in disgust. "Dude -"

"I'm just the messenger!" Dean protested.

"I'll kill you anyway," Sam joked. "I don't care. Operative, remember?"

Dean shoved him with his good shoulder. "Operative, my ass. You're a bitch."

"It's been said."

Two days later, Dean was practicing tossing darts in the Roadhouse with his left arm when Meg sidled up. "Gabriel's gone," she said.

Dean processed that for a moment. "Surprised it took him this long."

Meg shrugged. "He and Bela hit it off."

"That's... terrifying."

"You're telling me."

Thunk. Thunk. Thunk. The darts landed on (or near) the dartboard with dubious precision. Dean didn't protest when Meg collected them from the corkboard and took up position next to him, readying to throw.

"Any word from our renegade Operative?" she asked him. Her tone was too lighthearted. He looked at her sidelong.

"Radio dark," he said.

"Typical." She tossed the first dart. It landed dead-center, with so much force that Dean was sure it had buried itself into the wall beyond the board as well.

"He'll be back."

"Yeah," Meg sneered, tossing the next dart. It thunked into the board with even more force than the first, if that was possible.

Dean watched her for a long moment. "You and Cas," he said. "You guys aren't -"

"Me and Blue-Eyes? No," Meg said, throwing a third dart. It clustered neatly with the other two. "The guy's too clean for me. You know." She gave him the classic lopsided Meg-Smile. "Anyway, any idiot could see the guy was going all moony-eyed over someone else on our intrepid little boat." When Dean avoided her eyes, she grabbed his shoulder, forcing him to look at her. "Cap. I need you to pay attention now, 'kay? 'Cuz I don't throw in the towel on these things unless I really, really mean it." She crossed her arms and cocked her hip - the Meg Power Stance. "Blue-Eyes is a one-in-a-million kinda deal. Believe me. I know. So if you hurt him -"

"He's not here, Meg -"

"If you hurt him. I will slit your throat in your sleep." She tilted her head and looked him straight in the eye. "And you know I'm not fucking kidding."

The seconds had stretched painfully before Dean nodded. "Good," Meg said simply, before turning and tossing the final dart. It landed with its tip buried in the tail of one of the others - Robin-Hooding the first dart and decimating the game.

xXx

"You boys be careful now, y'hear?" Ellen wrapped her arms around Dean so tightly he thought he might explode, but the gesture filled his chest with warmth he'd deny to the ends of the 'verse. "If you all stumble back to this rock in pieces for the third time in two weeks, I will have words to say to you." She leaned closer and whispered in Dean's ear, "And she'll kill me if she hears me sayin' this, but - you take care of Jo?"

"Promise," Dean whispered back, "So long as you take care of Bobby."

The trade hadn't been his idea, but then again, Dean had always known that he was captain of the Impala in name only. "I'm too gorram old for this gig, boy," Bobby had grumbled to Dean, his misty eyes shaded beneath his trucker cap. "I'm here for you - always - but I'm more help to you as a haven than anything else."

And Jo had been right there, raring to pick up the reins Bobby had dropped. With her enthusiasm - and Charlie's support - Dean had been near-powerless to stop the exchange. "We're being taken over by women," he'd complained to Sam, glancing in despair at the lineup of Meg, Bela, Charlie, and Jo.

"Maybe," Sam had shrugged. "But it's a helluva group of women."

And Dean couldn't fault his logic there.

Speaking of Sam - he walked up to Dean, hand-in-hand with the Magnificent Jess. The medic patted Dean on the shoulder. "Don't get hurt too bad out there," she told him. "Sam would be very sad."

He felt his mouth twist into a smile. Jess tended to have that effect on him. "I'll do my best," he said. He glanced away as Jess pressed an enthusiastic kiss to Sam's mouth.

"Come visit soon," she whispered.

Sam seemed to struggle for words for a moment until Dean kicked him. "Okay," he said. Jess pressed a gentle hand to his cheek for a moment - and then was gone.

"I like her," Dean observed. "She doesn't, you know. Hang around. And she's way outta your league"

"Shut up," Sam said. "We ready to go?"

They broke atmo just as the sun was setting. This was Dean's favorite time to take off. It seemed fitting to end his time on Lawrence as the day itself was ending - poetic, in a super-embarrassing way. Dean banished Meg from the pilot's chair, determined to make this first post-Operative foray into the 'verse by himself.

There had been no word from Cas. Nothing. Perhaps blessedly, there had been no word from any of the other Operatives either, though Dean was under no misapprehensions about that. They would see Lucifer and Michael again. The crew of the Impala had ripped the universe apart for the Operatives. There was no way in hell that people like that would let such an action slide.

The black and the stars spread out before Dean, slumped low in the pilot's seat. He found himself smiling, despite the troubles that lay ahead. Sinking back in the leather of the chair, Dean closed his eyes. No matter what - he still had his boat. He had the Impala, he had his crew - he even had Lawrence now. If only he had -

"Hello, Dean."

No point in jumping, or even cracking open his eyelids. He should have expected this.

"Do I even want to know how you got aboard?"

"Most likely not."

At this, Dean did open his eyes, sliding a glance over at the copilot's seat. Sure enough, Castiel was sitting beside him, staring out at the blackness that surrounded the Impala on all sides with the sort of fascinated intent most people reserved for microscopes and porn. He was wearing a space suit. Dean formulated some hypotheses and dismissed them all, one by one.

"I thought you weren't coming back," he finally said.

"So did I. For a while." Cas met his eyes for a brief moment. "But then I changed my mind."

"Why?"

"I... went home." Cas shrugged. "At least, I thought I did."

"You're gonna have to be more specific than that, Cas."

"Fine." Now Cas was staring at him, blue eyes boring into his like lasers. "I saw my name on the Angel Tablet. I wanted to see where I came from." He leaned forward. "I was born James Novak on an outer rim planet called Whitefall. My parents called me Jimmy."

"Your father had a beard," Dean quoted under his breath.

Cas tilted his head, expression unreadable. "He did. He still does." Then - he ran both hands through his hair, making it stand on-end. "The information is out there. On the Operatives. Who was taken, who was chosen. But my father didn't recognize me. Or maybe he did - but he chose not to."

"Your mother -?"

"I did not see her, but my father had something approaching a shrine to her in his home. I would assume that she is dead." This was delivered in a tone so flat that Dean could probably drive Meg's transpo across it.

"I'm sorry, man." Dean wanted to reach out a hand to touch Cas, to comfort him, but the words kept coming, ripped out of someplace deep inside of him. "You should'a stuck around, though," he said. "We were worried about you."

"I can take care of myself."

"Hell, I know that by now," Dean said. "I just - we were worried about you." He sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose. "Towards the end there - before the whole showdown with Michael and his crew - you were acting kinda strange. Like you didn't want to know me - any of us. What was that about?"

"Dean -"

"Talk to me, Cas. C'mon."

"I was terrified, okay?" Cas stared at him, more wild-eyed than Dean had ever seen him. "You had seem me kill Crowley with my bare hands - I was terrified that you would see me as an Operative and nothing more. Just a blunt instrument - a hammer of the Alliance." His volume dropped and Dean could barely make out the next words. "I was terrified that - you would be - terrified - of me."

Now Dean did reach out, grasping Cas by the shoulder. "I would never," he said. "Never. Cas - you said you wanted to go home. But Whitefall, or wherever - that's not home." He squeezed Cas's shoulder, forcibly preventing the man from sliding his attention back to the windows. "This is your home. The Impala and everyone - and me - hell, I need you, Cas." He quirked a smile. "I've been going nuts without you here."

The intensity that flooded Cas's eyes damn near stole the air from Dean's lungs. "I ain't sayin'," he tried to continue through his breathlessness, "that it'll be easy, or anything particularly near noble. But I am sayin' - I guess I'm sayin' - just - stay." He whooped in a great gust of oxygen, blinking at Cas. "Please?"

In no time at all, Castiel's mouth was descending on Dean's. He let out a happy hum. "Guess that's a yes," he murmured against Cas's lips.

"That's a 'hell yes', Captain Winchester" Cas responded. Dean felt his dick twitch at the words - and a warm thrill in his heart.

Castiel's mouth opened readily under Dean's. He found himself pressing forward with an urgency that kind of embarrassed him - but it had been way, way too long since he'd felt Cas's lips on his. The thought of playing in any way 'hard to get' in this moment was completely laughable. Instead, he slid his fingers through Cas's tousled hair, crushing their mouths together in desperation. His lips would most likely be bruised the next morning. Dean didn't care.

"How the hell," he muttered, "do I get you out of this suit?"

Cas chuckled, sounding more carefree than Dean had ever heard him. "Here -" and he began undoing some unseen fastenings on the side that Dean couldn't begin to fathom. In a surprisingly short time, he was stepping out of the space suit, clad only in his customary thin blue shirt and trousers.

Dean gave him a predatory grin. "Good," he said. "I know how to deal with those."

His move towards the closure of Cas's trousers was intercepted by Cas himself. "Don't rip them," he instructed. "These are my only pants."

"Sir, yes sir," Dean agreed. "How about this?" With a delicate touch, he gently coaxed open the buttons of Cas's trousers, taking care to brush teasingly against the underwear-clad erection revealed underneath. Cas threw his head back against the backrest of the copilot's chair. A short groan escaped him, and Dean licked his lips. There was nothing better, in his opinion, than watching the typically buttoned-up Operative come undone.

"Stay like that," Dean ordered. "Exactly like that. Don't move." And he slid to his knees, positioning himself between Cas's thighs. The impressive length of Cas's erection was practically staring him in the face. His mouth watered - this was something he'd been looking forward to since - since - well, definitely since before their last liaison.

Dean leaned forward, letting his breath ghost over Cas's dick. "I've wanted this for a long time," he said. "Maybe even since we met. You remember that, Cas?" He eased the band of Cas's boxers down around his thighs. Cas's dick sprang free, bouncing against Cas's stomach. Dean licked his lips. "You were pretending to be some gorram waiter. You offered me a dumpling."

He took Cas in his mouth, relishing the other man's strangled groan as he sucked him down. "You were - _ah - _you looked so out-of-place," Cas managed. "Too real for that superficial world. I wanted to - _oh, God, Dean _- know you - know - _ah_ - you were just so - nearly was caught because I couldn't stop thinking about - _ah, ah, ah, Dean I'm going to - Dean -"_

Dean caught each burst of Castiel that raced across his tongue and swallowed it down, keeping his eyes on Cas's face the whole time. Cas had squeezed his eyelids shut against the torrent of pleasure - it was only when he managed to get hold of himself that he opened his eyes again. "That was -"

"It was," Dean agreed, lifting the other man's shirt enough to press a kiss over his heart.

In a moment, Cas was scrambling for Dean's belt buckle. Dean allowed him, easing himself backwards onto the floor. "Not on Meg's chair," he cautioned. "She'll know. And she'll never forgive me."

The mischievous smile that crossed Cas's lips nearly had Dean coming in his pants then and there. "Then we'll have to get creative."

And before Dean's eyes rolled back in his head - and before he began cataloging excuses to explain away strange stains on the bridge to other members of the crew, he smiled into warm blue eyes and felt something akin to _maybeIloveyou_ well up in his throat. "In that case," he finally managed. "Welcome home, Cas."


End file.
